February 19, 2014

Media Companies Lobby for Trans-Pacific Partnership

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Earlier this month, Media Matters for America published a short research note revealing that most major cable and broadcast news outlets have largely ignored the controversial Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. Media Matters’ “transcript search of CBS Evening News with Scott Pelly, ABC’s World News with Diane Sawyer, and NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams from August 1, 2013 through January 31, 2014 found no mention of the Trans-Pacific Partnership.” Cable news outlets have not been much better. Fox News and CNN spent virtually no time on the issue.

One outlet bucks the trend. MSNBC is the only private sector station to devote significant time to the trade deal.

This reporter appeared on MSNBC yesterday to discuss our scoop on multimillion dollar bonuses paid from CitiGroup and Bank of America to officials tapped to lead TPP negotiations; as Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) noted after our segment, MSNBC is one of the few corporate media outlets to cover the trade agreement.

Its worth noting that while these media companies have chosen to conceal the deal from their viewers, behind closed doors, they are spending a considerable sum ensuring that they emerge as beneficiaries of the TPP.

Time Warner Inc., the parent company of CNN,  has at least four lobbyists working to influence the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal. Disclosures show the TW lobbying team has attempted to influence both Congress and the U.S. Trade Representative office on the deal.

— Comcast, the parent company of NBC and MSNBC, has a team of at least ten lobbyists seeking to influence the TPP on “International IP Protection.”

— Twenty-First Century Fox, a subsidiary of News Corporation, the parent company of Fox News, has a team of three lobbyists working to influence the TPP.

— Disney Corporation, parent company of ABC News and Fusion, is lobbying on the TPP regarding intellectual property enforcement.

Media Matters’ graph of cable news coverage is below:

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