John,

For the past week and a half, the media has intensely focused election coverage on President Biden’s debate performance. 

The New York Times called for Biden to drop out of the race, and virtually every legacy media outlet is airing 24/7 speculation about the future of his campaign.

At the same time, the same networks are building an utterly false counter-narrative about Donald Trump: that he’s somehow running a “disciplined” campaign.

We’ll tell you why that analysis is so bad in just a moment, but if you’re ready to help us fight against misinformation and bias in the media, can you chip in $20 now?

So has Trump suddenly become a disciplined, focused campaigner in the last ten days? Absolutely not.

The proof is in Trump’s Truth Social account. Just take a look at some of the recent posts he’s shared with his millions of right-wing followers in the last ten days:

• He called on Liz Cheney, the former Congresswoman who headed the January 6 committee, to be tried on charges of treason in a televised military tribunal. 
• He called for dozens of his “political enemies,” including former Vice President Mike Pence, to be jailed. 
• He posted support for Steve Bannon, who is currently in jail for contempt of Congress.

According to the legacy press – that’s disciplined and “quiet.” See for yourself:

At least the New York Times qualified their analysis with “relatively.” However, it does make you wonder how many authoritarian threats a presidential candidate needs to make these days before the media bats an eye. 

Here at COURIER, we’re not afraid to set aside the outdated “both sides” method of election coverage and speak the truth: Donald Trump is making authoritarian threats that divide our country and create the same conditions that led to the violence we saw on January 6th. 

John, the bad news is that if the media keeps normalizing Trump’s authoritarianism, our democracy may never recover. 

But the good news is that COURIER is working around the clock to call out dangerous bias and misinformation in the media. COURIER has eleven newsrooms in battleground states across the country that push back against false narratives with fearless, fact-based coverage about the issues that matter most in the communities we serve.

But we need your help. We don’t rely on subscriptions or paywalls to fund our services, so we count on donations from supporters like you to keep running. Can you chip in $20 now to help us out?

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Thanks,
COURIER