Local news anchors across the country are reading from the exact same script on Joe Biden.
Local television news broadcasters are airing suspiciously similar attacks on Joe Biden’s mental acuity and how it will affect the coming election—and it appears to be part of a coordinated effort.
The Sinclair Broadcast Group owns or operates 185 local television stations across the country, and dozens of their stations aired a segment from national correspondent Matthew Galka citing a Wall Street Journal article that makes dubious attacks on Biden’s age and mental awareness. The stations that aired the segment introduced it using startlingly similar, if not identical language, the Popular Information and Public Notice newsletters reported.
It’s not the first time Sinclair, owned by right-wing businessman David D. Smith, has appeared to be running a conservative propaganda campaign. Infamously in 2018, dozens of the company’s TV stations were caught airing an identical editorial about the dangers of biased and false news. This time around, the Rupert Murdoch-owned Wall Street Journal, as well as Murdoch’s cable news stations Fox News and Fox Business, have gotten in on the act.
This is different. Sinclair owns local news channels. They are trying to mainstream right wing talking points in historically more neutral mediums. It’s a step beyond Fox’s tactics.
Also, there’s a feel of independence when it comes to local news.
They’re not historically more neutral, in the sense of editorial freedom, unless you’re going back to the 60s or something. It’s just that their common scripts were from ABC, CBS, or NBC, which were conservative enough but frustratingly linked to reality.
Sinclair isn’t different as much as they are radically right-wing. They may as well have a scowling Boris Epshteyn’s face on the screen for two minutes with scary music in the background. Anyone watching local news in 2024 is signing up for gruesomeness at some level.
That’s not true. The actual local news programming was entirely independent from the affiliated broadcast network. National news programming from the national news networks were carried, including more editorial/long form formats (60 minutes, Dateline, Nightline), but that was still independent from what the local stations were covering in their own newsrooms.