While Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has spent his past few weeks bashing the billionaire philanthropists Charles and David Koch, he has somehow forgot to mention liberal billionaire George Soros, whose money may be behind the recent controversial government study of newsrooms.
The study, ordered by the Federal Communications Commission, sought insight on how journalists and management determined a station’s news coverage. The study was highly criticized as a government attempt to regulate how newsrooms operate, and the FCC quietly killed the project in late February.
The Washington Examiner’s Byron York said on "Fox and Friends" Wednesday that the journalism schools involved with the FCC’s study were both recipients of large sums from the liberal Soros. Soros’ organization Open Societies Foundation gave $1.4 million to the University of Wisconsin’s journalism school, and $195,000 to journalism school at the University of Southern California.
"There seems to be a Democratic plan to target somebody every few years," York said, citing Democrats’ attacks on the Chamber of Commerce in 2010 and the Kochs in 2012.
York also pointed out that the Koch brothers are only 59th in total dollars spent on elections, falling behind many Democratic-leaning labor unions.
"Labor unions are by far and away the biggest, most influential donors and many of them give 90-plus percent of their contributions to Democrats," York said. "If you’re going to talk about money in politics, you can not just talk about the Koch brothers, you’ve got to talk about the big unions."