DC Trawler

Why is Media Matters tax-exempt?

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Is anybody still pretending they’re a nonpartisan organization? Because they’re as partisan as you can get. They’ve now given up pretending otherwise, as Vince Coglianese reports:

The far-left nonprofit Media Matters for America (MMFA) has attempted to court at least one Democrat lawmaker as its “all[y]” in “gain[ing] favorable media coverage” in the ongoing Keystone XL (KXL) pipeline debate. Claiming an alliance with lawmakers appears to be the latest red flag for the organization critics allege has frequently overstepped its tax-exempt privileges.

In an email distributed to the offices of both Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer and Republican Sen. James Inhofe on Wednesday — and obtained by The Daily Caller — Media Matters employee Emilee Pierce sought to “flag” a liberal study by the organization released Thursday in an effort to manipulate coverage of the Keystone pipeline.

The email, addressed to Boxer staffer Mary Kerr and Inhofe staffer Matt Dempsey, sought to “flag that MMFA will be putting out a major, quantitative report on media coverage of KXL tomorrow [Thursday] morning…”

“We are hoping for a big media splash, but — more importantly — we’re hoping that allies will be able to leverage it to gain favorable coverage,” Pierce continued.

“Allies.” What an interesting choice of words. Let ’em talk long enough, and eventually one of ’em will tell the truth by accident. And they might’ve gotten away with it too, if it weren’t for that pesky CC: field. Sending that to Inhofe by mistake is a cringey faux pas worthy of The Office. (If Dunder Mifflin didn’t have to pay taxes.)

In other Media Matters news, John Nolte at Big Journalism makes a convincing case that MMFA is a research arm of Politico. Like a typical wingnut, Nolte bases this smear on nothing but the available facts and evidence.

Personally, I’ve been a big fan of MMFA ever since one of their “senior fellows” lied about me as I lay in a hospital bed with a shattered knee. Hey, if I wanted them to act like human beings for once, I should’ve thought about that before I disagreed with them politically.