Rogan recently hosted Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., an outspoken anti-vaxxer and petri dish of misinformation.
Remember Joe Rogan, John? He gave us a shout-out earlier this year because of our mission to hold misinformation engines like him accountable:
Well, Rogan’s at it again. He recently had Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (an outspoken anti-vaxxer and petri dish of misinformation) on his podcast to promote his campaign for president — and it went pretty much exactly how you’d expect.
Before we go further, you should know that Courier and our affiliated newsrooms in 8 battleground states are working around the clock to hold bad actors like Rogan and Kennedy accountable, debunk their false claims, and deliver fact-based reporting to the communities that need it most. Can you pitch in $5 now to support our work?
Chip in $5 »
RFK Jr.’s strategy is straight out of the COVID misinformation playbook: He’s not making appearances in the mainstream media and he's avoiding any interactions with real journalists who might ask hard questions and hold him accountable.
Instead, he prefers to appear on podcasts hosted by people like Rogan, where he’ll be praised as an “outsider” and a “truth-teller” instead of called out for pushing dangerous and debunked lies about vaccines and other issues.
The scariest part is his strategy is working. In recent weeks RFK Jr.’s poll numbers have gone up — and the mainstream media is taking notice. They’ve even started to cover his campaign much in the same way they covered Trump in 2016.
Unfortunately, rather than getting the facts to the public and debunking misinformation, this type of profit-driven, sensationalized coverage is likely to help RFK Jr.’s campaign in the end, just as it helped Trump’s.
That’s why Courier exists, John. Our newsrooms across 8 battleground states operate in “news deserts” that lack other reliable sources of local reporting, so our journalists are dedicated to picking up the mainstream media’s slack and calling misinformation out for what it is.
But it takes a lot of resources to support our newsrooms, and we’re counting on supporters like you to help us keep it up. So if you can, please pitch in $5 or any amount today to help us continue fighting back against misinformation.
Chip in $5 »
Thanks,
The Courier Newsroom Team
