Accuracy in Media

Accuracy in Media (AIM) was founded in 1969 by Reed Irvine, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank.{{Cite book|last1=Chapman|first1=Roger|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7e5nBwAAQBAJ|title=Culture Wars: An Encyclopedia of Issues, Viewpoints and Voices|last2=Ciment|first2=James|date=March 17, 2015|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781317473503|pages=339}}{{Cite journal|last=Goss|first=Brian Michael|date=August 1, 2009|title=The Left-Media's Stranglehold|journal=Journalism Studies|volume=10|issue=4|pages=455–473|doi=10.1080/14616700902783895|s2cid=143114959|issn=1461-670X}} In order to reduce what they perceive as bias in media reporting, AIM works to "investigate complaints, take proven cases to top media officials, seek corrections and mobilize public pressure to bring about remedial action."{{Cite news|last=Kaufman|first=Michael T.|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/19/us/reed-irvine-82-the-founder-of-a-media-criticism-group-dies.html|title=Reed Irvine, 82, the Founder of a Media Criticism Group, Dies|date=2004-11-19|work=The New York Times|access-date=2020-04-28|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}

Reed Irvine and then-executive secretary Abraham Kalish sent letters to the editors of many newspapers and magazines they identified as skewed, calling out slanted news stories. If the newspaper rejected the letter, AIM bought space and printed the letter in that newspaper. Beginning in 1975, Accuracy in Media began purchasing participating interests in major media companies, allowing Irvine to attend annual shareholder meetings. He used these opportunities to express the AIM's concerns to the various companies' owners. Reed's son, Don, chairs the organization. Don Irvine referred to his father as a "die-hard anti-communist."[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58852-2004Nov17.html Obituary of Reed Irvine, 82], The Washington Post, November 18, 2004. In 1990, Irvine was mentioned by Walter Goodman of The New York Times for "his efforts to put pressure on networks and advertisers to crack down on reporters to whom he takes exception do not mark him as an enthusiast of unfettered expression."{{cite news|last1=Goodman|first1=Walter|title=TV VIEW; Let's Be Frank About Fairness And Accuracy|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1990/06/17/arts/tv-view-let-s-be-frank-about-fairness-and-accuracy.html?mcubz=0|access-date=October 2, 2017|work=The New York Times|date=June 17, 1990}} Following Irvine's death in 2004, an editorial in the Columbia Journalism Review said that "[Irvine] was stone blind to his own prejudices, and he could be scurrilous and unfair in his attacks, but he knew something about our major media" and credited Irvine in part for the rise of the popular conservative view that the American media is imbued with a liberal bias.{{cite magazine|last1=Hoyt|first1=Mike|title=Defining Bias Downward: Holding Political Power to Account Is Not Some Liberal Plot|url=http://archives.cjr.org/behind_the_news/defining_bias_downward_holding.php|access-date=October 2, 2017|magazine=Columbia Journalism Review|date=January 5, 2005}}

According to The Washington Post, while Irvine worked at the Federal Reserve, co-workers he would eat lunch with often "complained that conservative points of view were not adequately reported in the media." In his way of changing this, Irvine formed AIM.{{Cite web|title=Media Watchdog Reed Irvine, 82 (washingtonpost.com)|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A58852-2004Nov17.html|access-date=2020-06-30|website=washingtonpost.com}}

It is also said that Reed Irvine was urged to start the organization after the 1968 Democratic National Convention because he thought the mainstream media networks were overly sympathetic to antiwar protestors.

Membership to AIM grew significantly when Reagan was president, topping 40,000 members with a budget of $1.5 million. As the organization grew, Reed Irvine was also a shareholder in media companies. During a shareholder meeting for TBS in 1989, Irvine said at the meeting that conservative leaning organizations had a difficult time getting their views presented on TBS and this was not the case for more liberal leaning groups.{{Cite news|last=Ap|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/07/22/arts/media-critic-accuses-turner-s-tbs-of-bias.html|title=Media Critic Accuses Turner's TBS of Bias|date=1989-07-22|work=The New York Times|access-date=2020-04-28|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}

{{as of|April 2020|post=,}} the current president of AIM is Adam Guillette.{{Cite web|url=https://www.aim.org/aim-column/aim-hires-adam-guillette-as-new-president/|title=AIM Hires Adam Guillette as New President|date=2019-10-18|website=Accuracy in Media|language=en|access-date=2020-04-28|archive-date=September 19, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200919185317/https://www.aim.org/aim-column/aim-hires-adam-guillette-as-new-president/|url-status=dead}}

AIM's income in 1971 was $5,000. By the early 1980s, it was $1.5 million. In 2009, AIM received $500,000 in contributions.{{Cite book|title=Deciding What's True: The Rise of Political Fact-Checking in American Journalism|last=Graves|first=Lucas|date=2016|publisher=Columbia University Press|isbn=9780231542227|pages=45}}

At least eight separate oil companies are known to have been contributors in the early 80s. Only three donors are given by name: the Allied Educational Foundation (founded and chaired by George Barasch), Shelby Cullom Davis, and billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife. Scaife gave $2.2 million to Accuracy in Media between 1977 and 1998.{{Cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1999/05/02/decades-of-contributions-to-conservatism/711c6621-3c29-401d-8d53-990cc298f020/|title=Decades of Contributions to Conservatism|year=1999|newspaper=The Washington Post}} AIM has been funded by Exxon.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qbVcIc8w6w4C&q=Oreskes+haydn+Climate+Change+Denial|title=Climate Change Denial: Heads in the Sand|last=Washington|first=Haydn|date=May 13, 2013|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781136530043|pages=159}}

{{Conservatism US|expanded=other organizations}}

AIM was critical of media reports about the harmful effects of Agent Orange, a military herbicide with adverse health effects for humans, in the Vietnam War. AIM blamed the U.S. media for the loss in the Vietnam War. AIM criticized the 1983 PBS documentary series Vietnam: A Television History as being pro-communist. According to The New York Times, one of AIM's greatest accomplishments was the documentary, Television's Vietnam: The Real Story in response to the PBS series.{{Cite web|url=https://www.upi.com/Archives/1986/01/22/PBS-accused-of-pro-communist-programming/2948506754000/|title=PBS accused of 'pro-communist' programming|work=United Press International|access-date=June 7, 2019}}

AIM charged the alliance conducting the NATO Kosovo intervention in 1999 with distorting the situation in Kosovo and lying about the number of civilian deaths in order to justify U.S. involvement in the conflict under the Clinton administration.{{cite web |last1=Irvine |first1=Reed |last2=Kincaid |first2=Cliff |title=Deceit And Lies Over Kosovo |url=https://www.aim.org/media-monitor/deceit-and-lies-over-kosovo/ |website=aim.org |publisher=Accuracy in Media |date=November 24, 1999 |access-date=May 12, 2020 |archive-date=March 29, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220329010712/https://www.aim.org/media-monitor/deceit-and-lies-over-kosovo/ |url-status=dead }}

AIM supported the Iraq War and accused the media of bias against the Iraq War in 2007, and alleged bias in mainstream media's coverage of the 2012 Benghazi attack. In 2008, AIM asserted "Waterboarding Is Not Torture" in a sub-heading. The article said that Guantanamo Bay detainees "are enjoying hotel living conditions" and that torture is what "left-wingers associate with anything that makes an accused terrorist uncomfortable".

In 1982, The New York Times reporter Raymond Bonner broke the story of the El Mozote massacre in El Salvador. The report was strongly criticized by AIM and the Reagan administration, and Bonner was pressured into business reporting, later deciding to resign.{{cite web |url=https://theintercept.com/2020/01/28/el-mozote-massacre-reagan-war-on-press/ |title= What The El Mozote Massacre Can Teach Us About Trump's War On The Press|last=Schwarz |first=Jon |date= January 28, 2020 |website=The Intercept |access-date=January 18, 2024 |quote=Accuracy in Media, the conservative media criticism organization, went further. Bonner, it declared, was waging "a propaganda war favoring the Marxist guerrillas in El Salvador." Meanwhile, a Times editor later said, the administration was engaging in a "really vicious" whisper campaign about him.}}

AIM was critical of journalist Helen Marmor, who in 1983 produced a documentary for NBC concerning the Russian Orthodox Church.{{Cite web |url=http://rightweb.irc-online.org/gw/1488 |title=Group Watch Profile: Accuracy In Media |access-date=September 6, 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090609160922/http://rightweb.irc-online.org/gw/1488 |archive-date=June 9, 2009 |url-status=dead }} AIM contended that "it ignored the repressive religious policies of the Soviet state."

AIM received a substantial amount of funding from Richard Mellon Scaife who paid Christopher W. Ruddy to investigate allegations that President Bill Clinton was connected to the suicide of Vince Foster.{{cite magazine |first=Trudy |last=Lieberman |url=http://archives.cjr.org/year/96/2/foster.asp |title=The Vincent Foster Factory|magazine=Columbia Journalism Review |date=April 1996|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040223081215/http://archives.cjr.org/year/96/2/foster.asp |archive-date=February 23, 2004}} AIM contended that "Foster was murdered",[http://www.aim.org/aim_report/A2212_0_4_0_C/ AIM Report: Evidence Proving Foster Was Murdered] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060914082336/http://www.aim.org/aim_report/A2212_0_4_0_C/ |date=September 14, 2006 }} July 1, 2001 which is contrary to three independent reports including one by Kenneth Starr.[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/whitewater/docs/foster.htm Full text] of the report on the 1993 death of White House counsel Vincent W. Foster, Jr., compiled by Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth Starr. After an exhaustive three-year investigation, Starr reaffirmed that Foster's death was a suicide AIM faulted the media for not picking up on the conspiracy,[http://www.realnews247.com/accuracy_in_media_vince_foster.htm Vincent Foster Murder Evidence] Accuracy in Media. and applied itself for Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) disclosure of Foster's death-scene photographs. Its suit to compel disclosure was denied by the District Court of Columbia in a summary judgment, unanimously affirmed by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.{{cite book|last=Cann|first=Steven J.|title=Administrative Law|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6V_lVpZGyIIC&pg=PA246|year=2005|publisher=SAGE|isbn=978-1-4129-1396-6|page=246|chapter=National Archives and Records Administration v. Favish 124 Ct. 1570 (2004)}}

AIM credited much of its reporting on the Foster case to Ruddy.See: Notes Section for "Chris Ruddy" [http://www.aim.org/publications/aim_report/2001/6.html The Case Against James T. Riady], Accuracy in Media 2001. Yet, his work was called a "hoax" and "discredited" by conservatives such as Ann Coulter,"Even if Christopher Ruddy's The Strange Death of Vincent Foster was considered a conservative hoax book, it was also conservatives who discredited it." Chapter Six Endnote 105, pp. 224–225, Slander, Ann Coulter. it was also disputed by the American Spectator, which caused Scaife to end his funding of the Arkansas Project with the publisher.[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/clinton/stories/scaife092998.htm Anti-Clinton Billionaire Goes Before Grand Jury] Washington Post, September 29, 1998, As CNN explained on February 28, 1997, "The [Starr] report refutes claims by conservative political organizations that Foster was the victim of a murder plot and coverup", but "despite those findings, right-wing political groups have continued to allege that there was more to the death and that the president and First Lady tried to cover it up."[http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1997/02/23/starr.report/ Report: Starr Rules Out Foul Play In Foster Death] CNN February 23, 1997

AIM has been critical of the United Nations and its coverage by the media. In February 2005, AIM alleged that United Nations correspondents, including Ian Williams, a correspondent for The Nation had accepted money from the UN while covering it for their publications. AIM also asserted that the United Nations Correspondents Association may have violated immigration laws by employing the Williams' wife.Accuracy in Media press release, [http://www.aim.org/press_release/2682_0_19_0_C/ "U.N. Reporters Group May Have Violated U.S. Immigration Law"] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081121093624/http://www.aim.org/press_release/2682_0_19_0_C/ |date=November 21, 2008 }}, February 22, 2005Cliff Kincaid, [http://www.aim.org/special_report/2656_0_8_0_C/ "Journalists Exposed on the U.N. Payroll; George Soros, Ted Turner Pay for Journalism Prizes"] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081203174904/http://www.aim.org/special_report/2656_0_8_0_C/ |date=December 3, 2008 }} Accuracy in Media, February 15, 2005 Williams and The Nation denied wrongdoing.The Nation, [http://www.thenation.com/doc/20050314/infact/ "In fact ..."], February 24, 2005Ian Williams, [http://www.mediachannel.org/views/dissector/affalert328.shtml "Confessions of a Payola Pundit"] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070610063428/http://www.mediachannel.org/views/dissector/affalert328.shtml |date=June 10, 2007 }}, Mediachannel.org, February 23, 2005

AIM has campaigned against the United States signing the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). AIM writes, "UNCLOS is a foot in the door for a wide-ranging international agenda... America's survival as a sovereign nation hangs in the balance." AIM argued that signing up to UNCLOS could lead to the prohibition of spanking children.

AIM rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. In 2008, AIM wrote, "the theory of man-made global warming is designed to increase government control over our economy and our lives through higher taxes and energy rationing."

In November 2005, AIM columnist Cliff Kincaid criticized Fox News for broadcasting a program The Heat is On, which reported that global warming represents a serious problem (the program was broadcast with a disclaimer). Kincaid argued the piece was one-sided and stated that this "scandal" amounted to a "hostile takeover of Fox News."Cliff Kincaid, [http://www.aim.org/aim_column/4184_0_3_0_C "Hostile Takeover of Fox News"] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051227014515/http://www.aim.org/aim_column/4184_0_3_0_C |date=December 27, 2005 }}, November 21, 2005 In 2006, Kincaid criticized Fox for "tilting to the left" on the issue of climate change.{{Cite web|url=https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/fox-news-drifting-left/9366/|title=Fox News Drifting Left?|website=Adweek|date=January 25, 2006 |access-date=June 7, 2019}}

AIM criticized the media for not covering a 1995 study on climate change, which it argued cast doubt on climate change. One of the authors of the study responded to AIM, "The paper... focused on a discrepancy between observations and theoretical climate model predictions—the sort of thing that climate change deniers love to take out of context and hype. The conservative organization Accuracy in Media took note of the study, citing lack of media coverage of it as some sort of evidence of media bias in coverage of climate change—something that I, to this day, find puzzling as the paper actually dealt with a relatively obscure technical detail of climate models and hardly challenged the mainstream view that human activity was leading to the warming of the globe."{{Cite book|url=https://cup.columbia.edu/book/the-hockey-stick-and-the-climate-wars/9780231152549|title=The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines|last=Nye|first=Michael E. Mann With a foreword by Bill|date=March 2012|publisher=Columbia University Press|isbn=9780231526388|pages=281–282}}

In 2008, AIM described Barack Obama, who was at the time a candidate in the 2008 presidential election, as "the most radical candidate ever to stand at the precipice of acquiring his party's presidential nomination. It is apparent that he is a member of an international socialist movement." AIM titled one of its reports, "Is Barack Obama a Marxist Mole?" In the lead-up to the 2008 election, AIM wrote, "there is a pattern of people who hate America showing up at critical junctures in Obama's life and career to influence and advise him."

In March 2020, the president of AIM, Adam Guillette, took a stance on the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, asserting that the media is exaggerating the pandemic.{{Cite web|title=Coronavirus Crisis: Still Dividing Americans More Than Uniting Them?|url=https://www.npr.org/2020/03/18/816273140/coronavirus-crisis-still-dividing-americans-more-than-uniting-them|access-date=2020-06-24|website=NPR.org|date=March 18, 2020 |language=en|last1=Elving |first1=Ron }}

The organization gives out the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award, which has attracted controversy for some of its recipients.

In 2010, AIM gave the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award to political activist Marc Morano, who is known for running the website ClimateDepot, which rejects the scientific consensus on climate change.{{Cite web|url=https://www.mediamatters.org/research/2012/12/27/climate-change-misinformer-of-the-year-marc-mor/191878|title=Climate Change Misinformer of the Year: Marc Morano|date=December 17, 2012|website=Media Matters for America|access-date=June 7, 2019}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.nrdc.org/experts/frances-beinecke/climate-change-scientific-reality-not-political-debate|title=Climate Change Is a Scientific Reality, Not a Political Debate|last1=March 17|last2=Beinecke|first2=2010 Frances|website=NRDC|date=March 17, 2010 |access-date=June 7, 2019}}

In 2011, AIM gave the award to Tucker Carlson.{{Cite web|url=https://www.salon.com/2011/01/31/tucker_carlson/|title=Tucker Carlson to receive media "accuracy" award|date=January 31, 2011|website=Salon|access-date=June 7, 2019}}

In 2013, AIM gave the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award to Jim Hoft, who runs The Gateway Pundit, a website renowned for publishing falsehoods and hoaxes.{{Cite web|url=https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/02/27/zahra-vaid-gateway-pundit_n_9334326.html|title=Toronto Student Falsely Accused Of Mass School Stabbing By U.S. Site|date=February 27, 2016|website=HuffPost|access-date=June 7, 2019}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.mediamatters.org/blog/2013/03/14/today-at-cpac-chronically-dishonest-blogger-jim/193063|title=Today at CPAC: Chronically Dishonest Blogger Jim Hoft To Receive Accuracy In Media Award|date=March 14, 2013|website=Media Matters for America|access-date=June 7, 2019}}{{cite web|first1=Ben|last1=Schreckinger|access-date=2020-07-31|title='Real News' Joins the White House Briefing Room|url=https://politi.co/2OcbgGP|website=POLITICO Magazine|date=February 15, 2017 }}

In 2022, AIM sponsored an ad campaign against antisemitism that used a truck with a digital image of Hitler giving the Nazi salute. The image included the text: "All in favor of banning Jews, raise your right hand." Several rocks were thrown at the truck. The use of the imagery was criticized by the Anti-Defamation League and the UC Berkeley chapter of Hillel International.{{cite news |last1=Stutman |first1=Gabe |title=Hitler truck display at UC Berkeley alarms Jews in campus community |url=https://jweekly.com/2022/10/14/hitler-truck-display-at-uc-berkeley-alarms-jews-in-campus-community/ |access-date=15 October 2022 |work=J. The Jewish News of Northern California}}

In October 2023, following the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel, AIM initiated a controversial campaign in which they displayed the names and images of college students who had expressed support for Palestine on trucks. This event sparked significant debate and controversy around issues of free speech, privacy, and online harassment.{{cite web |url=https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2023/10/12/doxxing-truck-students-israel-statement/ |title=As Students Face Retaliation for Israel Statement, a 'Doxxing Truck' Displaying Students' Faces Comes to Harvard's Campus |last1=Hill |first1=J. Sellers |last2=Orakwue |first2=Nia L. |date=October 12, 2023 |website= The Harvard Crimson |access-date=January 18, 2024}}{{cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/oct/16/harvard-billboard-hamas-informing-america-foundation |title=Harvard billboard accusing students of antisemitism linked to rightwing funder |last=Wilson |first=Jason |date=October 16, 2023 |website= The Guardian |access-date=January 18, 2024 }}{{cite web |url=https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2023/11/israel-palestine-campus-speech-lukianoff-fire/ |title=The Crackdown on Pro-Palestinian Students Is a Disaster for Free Speech |last=Schulman |first=Jeremy |date=November 11, 2023 |website=Mother Jones|access-date=January 18, 2024}}

On Nov. 16, 2023, such a "doxxing truck" sponsored by AIM, with a three-sided digital billboard, drove through Yale's campus displaying photos and names of at least 6 Yale students, 5 of which are graduate students of color, under a banner reading "Yale's Leading Antisemites." A website address printed on the side of the truck directed to a page with AIM's logo, which requested people petition Connecticut government officials and Yale to take action against those students.{{cite web | url=https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2023/11/17/doxxing-truck-appears-on-yales-campus-displays-student-names-and-photos/ | title='Doxxing truck' appears on Yale's campus, displays student names and photos | date=November 17, 2023 }} In late January 2024, AIM had a doxxing truck at CU Boulder in Colorado;{{Cite web |last=Adlen |first=Lucy |date=2024-02-09 |title=CU community discusses free speech and antisemitism in the wake of 'doxxing' campaign |url=https://www.cuindependent.com/2024/02/08/cu-discusses-free-speech-and-antisemitism-doxxing-campaign/ |access-date=2024-02-14 |language=en-US}} one professor moved class online as a consequence.{{Cite web |date=2024-01-31 |title="Doxxing truck" at CU Boulder prompts professor to move class online |url=https://www.denverpost.com/2024/01/31/cu-boulder-doxxing-truck-palestine-hamas-israel/ |access-date=2024-02-14 |website=The Denver Post |language=en-US}}

• Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting

{{Reflist}}

• {{Official website}}
• {{ProPublicaNonprofitExplorer|237135837}}
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20060903043744/http://www.mediatransparency.org/recipientprofile.php?recipientID=1374 Accuracy in Media, Inc.] by MediaTransparency
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20150211042952/http://nccsweb.urban.org/communityplatform/nccs/organization/profile/id/237135837/popup/1 Organizational Profile] – National Center for Charitable Statistics (Urban Institute)
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20090414141948/http://mediamatters.org/items/200512100001 Profile of Cliff Kincaid] by Media Matters for America December 9, 2005
• [http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1972 Meet the Myth-Makers: Right-Wing Media Groups Provide Ammo for "Liberal Media" Claims] by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting
• [http://archives.lib.byu.edu/repositories/14/resources/11043 Accuracy in Media records, MSS 2194], at the L. Tom Perry Special Collections Library, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University

{{Authority control}}

Category:Media analysis organizations and websites

Category:Organizations established in 1969

Category:1969 establishments in the United States

Category:Conservative organizations in the United States

Category:Climate change denial