AT&T inspired and funds far-right One American News
Reuters uncovers that AT&T execs wanted another "conservative" news network, so they funnelled tens of millions of dollars to far-right start-up OAN.
AT&T to Facebook: “Hold my beer.”
A blockbuster story from Reuters today about how AT&T was the inspiration, and lead funder, behind the creation of One American News Network (OAN), the pro-Trump propaganda network that is so far right they make Fox News look like MSNBC.
OAN, for example, is still promoting the lie that the election was stolen. And unlike Fox News, which tends to promote these lies as part of its opinion programing, OAN is still doing it as actual “news.”
If you’re not familiar with OAN, it’s difficult to explain just how bad they are. They truly make Fox News look fair and balanced. Imagine handing a TV network to the worst Internet trolls you can find, that’s OAN.
And the fact that AT&T was behind it — and continues to fund it! — is just unbelievable. My friend Michael is spot on about just how bad this is:
In a nutshell, OAN’s founder and chief executive, Robert Herring Sr., says it was AT&T executives who inspired him to create OAN, and who funds it to the tune of millions.
You see, as Herring tells it, the AT&T execs were upset that there was only one conservative TV network, Fox News. While, the execs claimed, there were seven liberal networks (the AT&T execs, according to Herring, considered all the non-Fox TV networks to be left-wing).
So Herring, inspired by AT&T, decided to create OAN. But the story doesn’t end there. AT&T then funded OAN to the tune of tens of millions of dollars, and still does.
More from Reuters:
Since then, AT&T has been a crucial source of funds flowing into OAN, providing tens of millions of dollars in revenue, court records show. Ninety percent of OAN’s revenue came from a contract with AT&T-owned television platforms, including satellite broadcaster DirecTV, according to 2020 sworn testimony by an OAN accountant.
Herring has testified he was offered $250 million for OAN in 2019. Without the DirecTV deal, the accountant said under oath, the network’s value “would be zero.”
As for just how bad OAN is, here’s an OAN host a few months ago, calling for the execution of tens of thousands of Americans who, he claims, stole the election from Trump:
And here’s more from Reuters on how OAN, and its chief executive, Herring, handled the January 6th Insurrection:
On January 6, after Trump supporters broke into the U.S. Capitol, an OAN news director cautioned staff via email, “Please DO NOT say ‘Trump Supporters Storm Capitol …’ Simply call them demonstrators or protestors … DO NOT CALL IT A RIOT!!!”
A day later, Herring suggested the riot might be a false-flag operation by the leftwing Antifa movement. “We want to report all the things Antifa did yesterday. I don’t think it was Trump people but lets investigate,” he emailed OAN producers. The Federal Bureau of Investigation says there is no evidence of Antifa involvement in the riot. All but a handful of the some 600 suspects charged so far have been rightwing Trump backers.
The next day, Herring tweeted: “If anyone thinks we will throw the best President America has had, in my 79 years, under the bus, you are wrong. We will continue to give him honest coverage.”
After the horrific revelations about Facebook this week, you’d think I’d stop being surprised about just how evil corporations can be. But, I still am. (Maybe less surprised than sickened.) That AT&T execs would help create and fund one of the most divisive and hateful propaganda outlets in America today…. I just can’t.
And mind you, the Insurrection isn’t over. Past is prologue. There’s surely more to come from Trump and his supporters. And OAN is happy to fan the flames. That means AT&T is helping the flames of future Insurrections. An American company doing the most un-American of things: Helping inspire people who tried to violently overthrow our government.
Folks, we need to obliterate AT&T online. Find them here on Twitter and Facebook (I know, Facebook… but this is an exceptional request), and let them have it.
In other news
Just nasty
Excellent read
69th floor!
Arouses?
Lindsey Graham heckled for pushing the vaccine
Vultures!
Rapid Covid tests
Other countries are providing free ones, while I couldn’t find one in DC, and finally found a single pharmacy that had it — $33, and insurance won’t reimburse.
An instant before happiness
That’s it for today. More to come. JOHN
Oh dear God. It's one thing for the head of a company to privately donate and support hateful groups and people. It's quite another for a corporation to do it with company funds. Then anyone using AT&T is directly supporting far-right fascism. It's like Chik-Fil-A spending company money to take away basic rights from gay people. (Their chicken sandwich isn't that good!) Every AT&T employee with a brain should also be furious. Not to mention stockholders. Ugh.
I finally got the courage to switch wireless carriers not only because AT&T was more expensive but also when I started reading articles on the sites I subscribe to (, Palmer Report, Thom Hartman and this site, etc.) about right wing donor corporations I decided to dump AT&T. It was difficult and after multiple calls to AT&T I finally disengaged from their service. Not sorry