Dish Network subsequently set up its own website regarding the dispute. Our research analyzes local news broadcasts across the country, comparing Sinclair-owned stations' coverage patterns to those of other stations in the same market and, when Sinclair acquires . and Unallocated Expenses. The infomercial aired at various times during the weekend of October 30, 2010, on Sinclair-owned stations in Madison, Cape Girardeau, Lexington, Pittsburgh, Des Moines, and Winston-Salem all in swing states vital to the 2010 elections. Sign up for our newsletter to track moneys influence on U.S. elections and public policy. The Post noted that Sinclair-owned stations and its Washington bureau scored 15 exclusive interviews with Trump in a one year period, that they would positively frame questions for Trump surrogates, that a Sinclair executive and conservative commentator who appears on Sinclair stations regularly criticized Clinton or highlighted positions favorable to Trump in his on-air commentaries, and that news stories and features favorable to Trump or that challenged Clinton were distributed to Sinclair stations on a must-run basis. From the December 22 article: A review of Sinclairs reporting and internal documents shows a strong tilt toward Trump. In 2008, Sinclair aired an ad from a conservative group smearing then-Sen. Obama by linking him to the founder of the Weather Underground, Bill Ayers, according to The New York Times. block that shit right off the television. we are sinclair We believe Sinclair Broadcast Group's people are our most important asset. Before the 2004 presidential election, Sinclair drew sharp criticism, including from Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, for its refusal to broadcast an episode of Nightline devoted to reciting the names of every member of the military killed in action in Iraq. at the very least, know which stations are owned and manipulated by Sinclair Broadcasting in your city. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. Mediacom and lawmakers from Iowa and Alabama asked the FCC to intervene. One employee admitted they had tried to reduce their prominence by deliberately scheduling them during lesser-viewed portions of newscasts such as around commercial breaks as an act of malicious compliance with Sinclair's must-run rules. The federal agency that regulates the U.S. television industry slapped the . The Baltimore Sun reported that WBFF staff internally objected to the editorial, as they felt that the endorsement would "undermine public faith in their political objectivity". The FCC has permitted broadcast television stations to use their digital 20005. DirecTV stated "we will compensate Sinclair fairly, but our customers should not be forced to pay more than twice as much for the same programs that remain available completely free of charge over the air and online. The video was removed due to allegations of antisemitism. The following table sets forth our cash flows for the years ended December 31, Press J to jump to the feed. [196] Sinclair maintains that the promos "served no political agenda." Of the $25million, $20.5million will be paid into a settlement fund. Tribune Media CEO Peter Kern stated that the sale "cannot be completed in an acceptable timeframe, if ever"; the suit cited Sinclair's "belligerent and unnecessarily protracted negations" with the Department of Justice and FCC over regulatory negotiations in order to maintain control of stations that it was advised to divest, as well as violations of the sale agreement requiring divestitures of stations to not result in any threats of regulatory scrutiny. Funding. Despite the extension, the two sides remained at an impasse over how much money Mediacom should pay Sinclair for carriage of its stations. [147][148][145] A 2019 study by Emory University political scientists Gregory J. Martin and Josh McCrain in the American Political Science Review found that "stations bought by Sinclair reduce coverage of local politics, increase national coverage and move the ideological tone of coverage in a conservative direction relative to other stations operating in the same market. The anchor of the evening newscast, Laurel Staples, read a statement that said, in part, NBC Montana takes pride in reporting only verifiable facts from an independent, reliable sources., New York has learned that KECI news director Julie Weindel was called by NBC News to see if KECI would cover the story or had any footage of the Gianforte incident that NBC News and its affiliates could use. Per a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Cunningham is owned by the estate of Carolyn Beth Cunningham Smith (from whom the company derived its name), the estate of Sinclair's controlling shareholders' parent, and trusts for the children of Sinclair's controlling shareholders. [38] Two of Sinclair's existing stations in markets affected by the Newport deal, WSTR-TV and KMYS, were sold to Deerfield Media. The ad is running in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Ad-Free Login If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. [165], In April 2017, Sinclair announced it had hired Boris Epshteyn, who was briefly the White House assistant communications director for surrogate operations for the Trump administration, and a senior advisor of Donald Trump's presidential campaign, as chief political analyst. On June 1, 2017, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals issued a seven-day administrative stay to the UHF discount rulemaking, in order to allow review of an emergency stay motion filed by The Institute for Public Representation (a coalition of public interest groups comprising Free Press, the United Church of Christ, Media Mobilizing Project, the Prometheus Radio Project, the National Hispanic Media Coalition and Common Cause) on May 15. A spokeswoman for Sinclair declined comment on the memo, which was firstreported by FTVLive. In 1990, David Smith and his three brothers bought their parents' remaining stock and went on a buying spree that eventually made it one of the largest station owners in the country, through the purchases of groups such as Act III Broadcasting (in 1995) and River City Broadcasting (in 1996). Sinclair defended the promos as non-partisan and its chairman was defiant, calling criticism "nonsense." The company doubled down, yanking a $25,000 donation to the National Press Photographers. Chesapeake's first foray into local news came in the early 1980s when it launched a newscast on WPTT, a rarity at this time for stations not affiliated with the then-major networks (ABC, CBS and NBC). 03/01/23 3:45 PM EST, Article Sinclair Media Networks (SMN) is the division of Sinclair that reaches the companys entire broadcast audience across its national footprint. FCC "must-carry" rules only apply to a station's primary digital stream. Mr. Obama has called Mr. Ayers somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8 years old.. At the same time, Sinclair aligned 17 of its stations (ten former WB affiliates, six former UPN stations, and independent WFGX) with MyNetworkTV, a programming service owned by Fox's parent News Corporation. [143] On September 27, 2021, The National Desk expanded to a two-hour evening newscast, airing 10 pm to midnight Eastern Time. Initial stations getting drone teams were in Washington, Baltimore, Green Bay, Wisconsin, Columbus, Ohio; Tulsa, Oklahoma and Little Rock, Arkansas. Even after the initial tweet was taken down, however, users began to come across other unrelated KBOI stories that shared this photo of McKesson at a protest rally. Except for the Revolving Door section, content on this site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License by OpenSecrets.org. (D. Van Zandt 4/2/2018) Updated (8/02/2021), Last Updated on August 2, 2021 by Media Bias Fact Check, Left vs. (B) Our greatest responsibility is to serve our Northwest communities. [40], Cox Media Group sold five television stations, their smallest by media market rankings, to Sinclair on February 25, 2013, with Deerfield Media assuming ownership of Cox-operated KAME-TV in Reno. Data for the current election cycle was released by the Federal Election Commission on For the 2018. Originally planning to divest four Sinclair-owned stations in three markets with Allbritton stations to Deerfield and Armstrong Williams-controlled Howard Stirk Holdings, and continuing to operate them under JSAs,[63] Sinclair then announced on March 21, 2014, intentions to divest three stations and one existing LMA to independent third parties. [133][134][135] Ransomware experts later indicated that the attack was likely linked to Evil Corp., a Russia-based cybergang that was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2019 and had been accused prior to the attack of attempting to rebrand itself to evade the sanctions; the hackers are believed to have disseminated the Macaw ransomware strain (which was also linked to a similar cyberattack that hit Olympus Corporation's corporate server network on October 10) within Sinclair's servers. Mar. [158][159][160], Sinclair often mandates its stations to air specific reports, segments, programs and editorials, referred to as "must-runs"; the full-length programs airing on the weekend include Armstrong Williams's weekly talk show, and Full Measure with Sharyl Attkisson. Sure is great we don't have a fairness doctrine or anything and right wing media can pump an unlimited stream of propaganda to local market consumers! [45][46], Prevailing in a bidding war with LIN Media, Sinclair purchased Fisher Communications on April 11, 2013, for $373.3million (equivalent to $434million in 2021), including 20 television stations in the western United States, operational control of one station, and three radio stations in Seattle. NY Times: Vast Majority Of Political Donations By Sinclair Chairman And His Brothers Have Been For Republican Causes. The New York Times reported that Sinclairs chairman and his brothers have become active in politics, with the vast majority of their money being funneled to Republican causes. From the May 3 article: Along the way, [Sinclair Chairman David] Smith and his brothers have become active in politics. And while most users found no faults with the story, they did notice that the accompanying photo that of civil rights activist DeRay Mckesson was not at all an accurate representation of the facts. [224] The two companies reached an agreement on January 15, 2011, shortly after the deadline was extended by another 24 hours. [50] Shortly after the announcement, a lawsuit was filed by a Fisher shareholder;[51] the suit was settled in July 2013[52] and the merger approved shortly thereafter. As a leading broadcast television company, our primary business is to engage consumers on multiple platforms with relevant and compelling news, entertainment and sports content, and to provide advertisers and businesses efficient means and value to connect with our mass audiences. [167], In July 2017, the HBO news comedy program Last Week Tonight devoted a segment to discussing Sinclair, where host John Oliver presented clips of various anchors using an identical script describing the FBI as having a "personal vendetta" against Michael Flynn, clips of Mark Hyman editorials (in which he compared multiculturalism and political correctness to a cancer epidemic, and stated that marriage was a solution to domestic abuse), and joked that the "Terrorism Alert Desk" segments defined terrorism as "anything a Muslim does". technical, maintenance, and building projects at our stations. Sinclair gave a disproportionate amount of neutral or favorable coverage to Trump during the campaign while often casting Clinton in an unfavorable light. "[138][145], In 2017, all Sinclair news-producing stations began inserting a waving American flag into the right corner of its lower third news graphics. A Trump spokesman said the deal included the interviews running across every affiliate but that no money was exchanged between the network and the campaign. Sinclair also supplied alternative programming feeds to fill airtime on some of the affected stations due to varying difficulties in transmitting and receiving certain syndicated program feeds or to occupy timeslots normally filled by newscasts (mainly from company-owned multicast networks like Stadium and TBD, or via a feed of its syndicated newscast The National Desk). [170], In April 2004, ABC broadcast a special episode of Nightline where host Ted Koppel listed the names of soldiers killed in the 2003 invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq. A Sinclair representative, meanwhile, stated that it "believes significant doubt exists as to whether or not a new agreement will be reached with Dish." [14], By 1967, Smith (as Chesapeake Engineering Placement Service) had applied for, and was granted, a construction permit for a new UHF television station in Baltimore.[15]. certain services and sales provided to the broadcast segment, which are and fourth quarters due to the anticipation of certain seasonal and holiday "[145][174], Later in October 2004, just two weeks prior to the 2004 presidential election, it was reported that all 62 of Sinclair's stations would preempt prime time programming to air Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal, a documentary critical of U.S. presidential candidate John Kerry's anti-Vietnam War activism. I think its a cool trend that you have news sites with names like Axios and Circa that almost sound like think tanks. [110][111][112] On February 21, 2018, Sinclair informed the FCC that it planned to sell off Tribune stations in New York City, Chicago, and San Diego, while seeking waivers to purchase the Tribune stations in Indianapolis, South Central Pennsylvania, and the Piedmont Triad. [211], Mediacom filed an antitrust lawsuit against Sinclair in October 2006, claiming that the group insisted on blanket carriage of 22 Sinclair-owned/managed stations across Mediacom-operated service areas where Sinclair operates a television station regardless of market differences. All rights reserved. The station later issued an apology on their Twitter account. From the July 14 article: Twitter was set ablaze on Friday night when news station KBOI 2 News posted a story about an attempted robbery in Idaho. TV broadcaster Sinclair fined $48 million over Tribune deal The federal government has fined TV broadcaster Sinclair $48 million, largely because of actions it took in its failed attempt to. They're pretty much the reason the right is the way it is. Subsequently, on August 21, 2014, the company announced the formation of Sinclair Original Programming, a new division concentrating on entertainment and commercial content. Political spending is significantly higher in the even-numbered years due to the cyclicality of political elections. Contributions by Source of Funds Sinclair Broadcast Group Affiliates i Cycle: 2020 Showing 1 to 3 of 3 entries Contributions to 527s are not included in the Individuals, PACs, Soft (Indivs), or Soft (Orgs) columns, so the sum of these columns may not equal the Total column. "[153], Sinclair has faced scrutiny from some media critics, as well as some of its station employees, for the conservative slant of their stations' news reporting and other programming decisions, and how the company's rapid growth has aided the airing of content that supports these views. New comments cannot be posted and votes cannot be cast. [75] ASN was created as part of the company's foray into original, non-news content creation beyond Ring of Honor Wrestling and school sports. [66] After nearly a year of delays, the deal was approved by the FCC on July 24, 2014,[67] and completed on August 1. and Unallocated Expenses. The promos have been criticized as in regard to the greater political context of "fake news" in the media for media bashing, comparing it to the rhetoric of Donald Trump in regard to these topics. It begin broadcasting on February 28, 2017. Some of their giving has been to Democrats, mostly for state and local races in Maryland. Sinclair responded by posting a video on its website that attacked CNN for "dishonesty and hypocrisy" in their coverage of the Sinclair must-run promo; Sinclair equated Stelter's warnings about "fake news" as similar to Sinclair's warnings in its must-run promo. While Sinclairs solicitation might raise the eyebrows of journalism purists, Ryan said there appears to be nothing legally noncompliant about the email. Circa News, an online outlet bought by Sinclair in 2015, has become a favorite of Sean Hannity among other Fox News personalities, along with far-right troll Mike Cernovich and Donald Trump Jr., with what critics claim is a stealthy emphasis on right-leaning, Trump-friendly content, according to The Daily Beast. [55] Prior to the deal, a seventh station, KDBC-TV in El Paso, Texas, to Cunningham,[56] fueling speculation KDBC-TV would be consolidated with Sinclair-owned KFOX-TV. Ad-Free Sign up Mckesson noticed this and retweeted a link to the story with the caption: I havent been anywhere near a bank robbery. liquidity and contractual cash obligations and an analysis of our cash flows But the commercial, a minute long, has run at least 100 times since Saturday, heavily in East Lansing and Pittsburgh. For the year ended December 31, 2022, we paid dividends of $1.00 per share. Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. is a diversified media company and leading provider of local news and sports. The channel was deleted on 3 out of 4 televisions in the house. For permission to reprint for commercial uses, The special also discusses Obama advisers Van Jones and John Holdren, as well as Obama staff Anita Dunn, Kevin Jennings, Carol Browner and Cass Sunstein all in an unflattering light; in one case, the special claimed that Holdren said that trees should be permitted to sue humans in court. But its partisan politics - and connections to the White House - are raising concerns Sinclair's size, rightwing politics and close. share. NewsON is the nations largest aggregator of local news content. All Last month, news anchors at Sinclair Broadcast Group's TV stations were required . [74] In July of that year, Sinclair announced the launch of the American Sports Network (ASN) service, operating within its Sinclair Networks company. We attempt to empower and, through our investment and employees dedication, break through the barriers to success and continue to build upon our already celebrated tradition. [80] The purchase of KSNV's non-license assets was completed on November 1, 2014. Full Measure is an award-winning, weekly national news program, focused on investigative, original, and accountability reporting. Such omissions suggest the existence of either journalistic incompetency or editorial bias. for the years ended December 31, 2022, 2021, and 2020: Corporate general and administrative expenses. She also pushed false reports about supposed government waste during the Obama administration and made inaccurate claims about the federal health care website based on partial information likely given to her by Republicans. Dielectric is a designer and manufacturer of broadcast systems including all components from transmitteroutput to antenna. In exchange, Sinclair would broadcast their Trump interviews across the country without commentary, Kushner said. There are two sides to every story, and Circa is telling the other side of the story., As for Circa News national security reporter, Sara Carter, Cernovich said: Shes become a real player, thats for sure., Carter is a frequent guest on Hannity to discuss her blockbuster stories alleging various improprieties by former President Obamas national security adviser Susan Rice and fired FBI director James Comey, and casting doubt on rival media reports of possible Trump campaign collusion with Russia (often alongside pugnacious Trump attorney Jay Sekulow, with whom Carter is said to be close). Its own website regarding the dispute, and 2020: Corporate general and administrative expenses largest aggregator of local content. 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