The biggest print purveyor in the news industry has been taking money to publish fake news supporting Republican candidates, highlighting mugshots of Black crime suspects, and mocking LGBTQ people.
Gannett -- which also publishes the conspiratorial Epoch Times -- hasn't commented on its publication of phony newspapers in Illinois such as “West Cook News” and “Chicago City Wire," which appear to be linked to Florida-based conservative talk show host Dan Proft, who has targeted Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, reported the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
"The fake newspapers previously were printed by a Chicago suburban newspaper, the Daily Herald, but the owner canceled the contract on Sept. 22 after Pritzker publicly chastised the company and refused to participate in a candidates’ debate sponsored by the Daily Herald," the Post-Dispatch reported. "Proft’s company, Local Government Information Services, then took its business to cash-strapped Gannett, lamenting that it had paid 'millions of dollars' to the Daily Herald’s publishing company, Paddock Publications, over a period of several years."
The publications have been repeatedly caught by fact-checkers for peddling misinformation, and their coverage of Pritzker's GOP challenger Darren Bailey appears to have lifted talking points from his campaign promotional materials.
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The phony newspapers are also oddly fixated profiling Chicago-area teens with notably low rankings in youth tennis.
“It has all the appearance and trappings of an official news organization, and it’s trying to hitch a ride off the credibility of newspapers built over time,” said Peter Adams, senior vice president of education at the News Literacy Project. “This crosses the boundary into propaganda.”
