| Friend — Earlier this month, we learned that AT&T executives helped build the far-right disinformation machine One America News Network (OANN) in 2013. Since then, the telecommunications giant has given tens of millions of dollars to OANN — providing a crucial lifeline that the network could not have survived without.
AT&T sat and watched as OANN gave Donald Trump and his allies a platform to promote lies about the 2020 election outcome day after day, hour after hour. They watched as OANN doubled down on lies about COVID-19. About vaccines. About fake cures like hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin.
Disinformation is deadly, and we are committed to making AT&T answer for propping up OANN. Please donate now while every gift up to $10,000 will be DOUBLED to support the fight against disinformation. According to reporting from Reuters,1 OANN founder and CEO Robert Herring Sr. testified in 2020 that his network’s value “would be zero” without its deal with AT&T’s DIRECTV.
AT&T has been perfectly happy to keep OANN afloat as thousands of people have become infected with COVID-19 — many of them believing the network’s lies about vaccines, masks and bogus treatments.
But now the world knows about how AT&T has bankrolled OANN, and we’re demanding action. Disinformation has become a defining issue of our times in large part because AT&T, Facebook and other companies have enabled dangerous conspiracy theorists, whites supremacists and networks like OANN.
Will you contribute to the fight against disinformation while your gift will go TWICE as far to help us fight disinformation? We only have until Oct. 31 to reach our $10,000 goal. Please make your gift now.
Thank you so much for your support,
Heather and the rest of the Free Press Action team
freepress.net
P.S. Thanks to your support, we were able to work with a producer at Last Week Tonight with John Oliver on last Sunday’s segment about non-English-language disinformation. We were able to get Trump kicked off social media because of support from our donors. We were able to include strong broadband-affordability measures in last December’s COVID-19 relief bill thanks to our donors. And with your help, we will make AT&T answer for its role in propping up OANN. Please donate now while your gift will be DOUBLED.
1. “How AT&T Helped Build Far-Right One America News,” Reuters, Oct. 6, 2021 Photo: The National Guard  |
