Right-Wing Media Ignored Epstein Survivors, Turned A Blind Eye To Press Conference
Analysis of thousands of articles with Ground News reveals a right-wing blackout on Epstein survivors' calls to release the Epstein files and skewed coverage of the scandal.
Over the past week, I’ve been paying close attention to how media outlets across the political spectrum have handled the release of the Epstein emails and the fight over the Epstein files. I have a multi-view setup in my living room where I see MS NOW, CNN, NewsNation, CNBC, and Fox News throughout my workday.
On Tuesday morning, I noticed that Fox News totally ignored a press conference where Epstein survivors and lawmakers called for the release of the Epstein files. Aaron Rupar also noticed this omission. Fox’s competitors, MS Now and CNN, aired the conference live and in full:
Moments after that press conference ended, Fox News immediately aired Speaker Mike Johnson’s press conference, held by Republican lawmakers, broadcasting only one side of the argument.
Last week, Fox News’ live broadcast ignored key revelations from the Epstein emails and wouldn’t spend significant time on the scandal. These omissions and selective broadcasts depict a false reality to their viewers.
These weren’t just one-off editorial decisions that happened to be caught in my anecdotal observations. This pattern was reflected across right-wing media.
In an effort to try to quantify this discrepancy in coverage, I used this great tool called Ground News. It’s a news site and app that analyzes articles from 50,000 news sources daily, tracks their bias, compares headlines, and showcases how each outlet is covering a given story, or if they’re covering it at all. It’s an excellent tool I use and have recommended to students for years in my media literacy and anti-disinformation guest lectures.
One of the first findings I noticed when analyzing the Epstein coverage was the fact that Fox News wasn’t the only right-wing outlet that ignored the Epstein survivors this week.
I used Ground News' Blindspot feature, which found that literally zero right-wing media outlets covered the Public Service Announcement that Epstein survivors released on Sunday, calling for the release of the Epstein files.
You can see for yourself, there were zero right-wing outlets found in the thousands of articles Ground News analyzed. The PSA was covered by center and liberal-leaning outlets.
That was eyebrow-raising, so I wanted to look at what other Epstein stories right-wing media organizations were ignoring. Ground News is also tracking all stories related to Jeffrey Epstein and any other topics you could think of.
A new Morning Consult poll released on Tuesday found that 60% of Americans believe Donald Trump knew of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse. As of the time of this writing, not a single right-leaning outlet has covered this poll, according to Ground News.
Choosing what stories to cover is a powerful way to shape the narratives that the American public buys into. It’s been clear that right-wing media have covered the Epstein scandal in a way that protects President Trump.
With Trump-allied billionaires increasingly consolidating media outlets, it’ll be more important than ever to support independent media and call out these distortions in coverage.
That’s why I’m happy to partner with Ground News on a series of articles using their technology to analyze how outlets across the political spectrum cover this political moment. This is a partnership I’m really excited about because Ground News aligns with my core values of promoting media literacy, opposing disinformation, and giving readers a clear-eyed view of the information ecosystem.
Like me, Ground News is supported by subscriptions. If you use my link, ground.news/ahmed, you’ll get 40% off your subscription, which is only $5 a month. Because this is a partnership, this also supports my independent journalism. Ground News is the real deal, and I couldn’t recommend it more
You can use it as a casual news site and get a bird’s eye view of exactly how the biggest stories in politics are being covered, or as an investigative tool to catch disinformation campaigns in real-time.
I’m subscribed to their Vantage plan, which includes the Blindspot feature I used when researching for this piece. It’s been invaluable in helping me to understand the media landscape and quantify how the biggest developments are covered. It also tells you who funds each media organization, so you can make an informed decision about which companies you’re supporting.
I hope you all check it out. And be on the lookout for more articles in the coming weeks where I analyze the broader media landscape. We have to hold our media to a higher standard, call out false narratives when we see them, and take our media diet into our own hands.
Thanks for sharing, I’m not surprised that the usual suspects, Fox News and others aren’t airing Trumps involvement in the Epstein case nor acknowledging Epstein victims with their misogynistic views and disgusting behavior. I honestly rather get my info from independent sources such as Substack media. I have noticed the people in my circle who leaned towards Trump are leaning towards a much more informed tone and changing their output. The polls indicate Trump support on the decline which tells me the people I had to argue with since January are starting to wake up, but let’s not forget there is still a MAGA movement and racially triggered US citizens out there whether or not Trump is involved, he’s just a tip of the iceberg.
I saw that as well! I am a subscriber to Ground News and love it! Highly recommend it! Thank you for your coverage and putting everything "right here" for us all! I'm angry of our lack of positive culture within our country on all things female and scandal!