Truthout

Truthout
Type of site
 News, political analysis & commentary, Progressivism
Headquarters Sacramento, California
Website www.truthout.org
Alexa rank Increase 21,478 (January 2017)[1]
Commercial No
Registration Optional
Launched 2000
Current status Active

Truthout is a nonprofit progressive news organization dedicated to providing daily coverage and commentary. With no advertising or corporate backing, Truthout depends on its readers and donations from foundations who support their work. Donations from individual readers have accounted for an average 81 percent of their annual budget over the last five years. Some of Truthout's main areas of focus are mass incarceration, social justice and climate change.

Truthout's editorial team is led by editor in chief Maya Schenwar[2], and managing director Ziggy West Jeffery.

Coverage examples

Safety issues at BP

60 Minutes cited a report published at Truthout as a source for its May 16, 2010 episode about the BP oil spill and the whistleblower who warned about a possible blowout at another BP deepwater drilling site.[3] Digital Journal wrote up the story.[4] CNN's Randi Kaye in an article cited a report by Truthout as the first article on BP Alaska employee Mark Kovac's inside knowledge about the safety concerns at the Prudhoe Bay, Alaska BP oil field.[5] On July 14, 2010, the United States House of Representatives Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure held a hearing in the Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials. The hearing[6] titled "The Safety of Hazardous Liquid Pipelines (Part 2): Integrity Management", cited an investigative report by Truthout as a document for the committee's investigation.[7]

Veterans' issues

Truthout has closely followed issues affecting Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. Coverage has especially focused on veteran health care and post-traumatic stress disorder. An ongoing Truthout investigation has claimed widespread neglect within the Veterans Health Administration of veterans with PTSD.[8][9]

Health Care: Defending the ACA, Fighting for Single Payer

Truthout covered repeated efforts to pass “Trumpcare.” They clearly outline that they are not impartial on the matter as they believe it to be an issue which is "literally a matter of life and death"[10] for millions of Americans. Truthout has published reporting both on the fine print details of the proposed legislation and the groups who are fighting back.

Awards

Dahr Jamail was awarded the Izzy Award for outstanding achievement in independent media for his reporting on climate change and other environmental issues. The judges wrote: "There is an urgency and passion in Dahr Jamail’s reporting that is justified by the literally earth-changing subject matter. And it’s supported by science and on-the-scene sources, whether covering ocean pollution, sea level rise, deafening noise pollution or Fukushima radiation."[11]

Jamail’s monthly wrap-ups of the latest climate research and trends – “Climate Disruption Dispatches”[12] – have become an essential resource for scientists and fellow journalists.

Controversies

Example: FBI Section Chief of International Terrorism Division's Memo to Immigration About Abu Zubaydah[13]

On May 13, 2006, after Jason Leopold posted on Truthout that Karl Rove had been indicted by the grand jury investigating the Plame affair, Rove spokesman Mark Corallo denied the story, calling it "a complete fabrication".[14] Truthout defended the story, saying on May 15 they had two sources "who were explicit about the information" published,[15] and confirmed on May 25 that they had "three independent sources confirming that attorneys for Karl Rove were handed an indictment" on the night of May 12.[15] The grand jury concluded with no indictment of Rove.[16]

In his memoir, Courage and Consequence, Karl Rove addressed the Leopold article. Rove writes that Leopold is a "nut with Internet access" and that "thirty-five reporters called [Rove's defense attorney] Luskin or Corallo to ask about the Truthout report." According to Rove, "[Special Counsel] Fitzgerald got a kick out of the fictitious account and e-mailed Luskin to see how he felt after such a long day."[17]

Jason Leopold no longer works at Truthout. He is now a senior investigative reporter at BuzzFeed.

Staff

Truthout is led by Editor-in-Chief Maya Schenwar, and Managing Director Ziggy West Jeffery.[18]

Truthout's Board of Directors is made up of McMaster University Professor and educational theorist Henry A. Giroux, policy director Robert Naiman, and Lewis R. Gordon.

Truthout's Board of Advisors includes Mark Ruffalo, Dean Baker, Richard D. Wolff, William Ayers, Mark Weisbrot, and the late Howard Zinn.

On August 27, 2009, a member of Truthout's board of directors signed a recognition statement by the organization of The Newspaper Guild/CWA, allowing employed writers for the site to unionize with the Newspaper Guild/CWA as their preferred bargaining representative. The site also held what it called the first-ever "virtual card check", whereby paid writers faxed PDFs of their individual signatures to members of the site's organizing committee (who were based in New York, Sacramento, Los Angeles and Chicago respectively) in order to verify their unionizing authorization cards and establish a bargaining unit of the writers. Maya Schenwar and Matt Renner stated in their article on the event that the organization was "the first online-only news site to successfully unionize".[19]

References

  1. ↑ "Truth-out.org Site Info". Alexa Internet. Retrieved 2017-01-03.
  2. ↑ "Staff | Truthout". Truthout. Retrieved 2018-09-27.
  3. ↑ "Blowout: The Deepwater Horizon Disaster". CBSnews.com. May 16, 2010. Retrieved June 12, 2010.
  4. ↑ "Report: Bush DoJ sheltered BP executives from criminal probe". DigitalJournal.com. May 21, 2010. Retrieved June 12, 2010.
  5. ↑ "BP Alaska: A Ticking Time Bomb?". ac360.blogs.cnn.com. June 23, 2010. Retrieved July 21, 2010.
  6. ↑ "The Safety of Hazardous Liquid Pipelines (Part 2): Integrity Management". transportation.house.gov. Archived from the original on August 3, 2010. Retrieved July 21, 2010.
  7. ↑ "The Safety of Hazardous Liquid Pipelines (Part 2): Integrity Management. - Page 6, footnote 17" (PDF). July 14, 2010. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 4, 2010. Retrieved July 21, 2010.
  8. ↑ "Veterans Attest to PTSD Neglect by VA". Scoop.co.nz. January 30, 2009. Retrieved June 12, 2010.
  9. ↑ "PTSD Ignored on Active Duty". Veterans for Common Sense. July 16, 2009. Archived from the original on June 11, 2010. Retrieved June 12, 2010.
  10. ↑ "Truthout Annual Report" (PDF).
  11. ↑ "Izzy Award to be Shared by Investigative Journalists Lee Fang, Sharon Lerner, Dahr Jamail and Todd Miller". Ithaca College. Retrieved 2018-04-05.
  12. ↑ Jamail, Dahr. "Climate Disruption Dispatches, With Dahr Jamail". Truthout. Retrieved 2018-04-05.
  13. ↑ "EXCLUSIVE: From Hopeful Immigrant to FBI Informant - the Inside Story of the Other Abu Zubaidah". Truth-out.org. Retrieved 2013-05-22.
  14. ↑ "Rove Indictment Report Denied". New York Sun. May 15, 2006. Retrieved June 12, 2010.
  15. 1 2 "Jason Leopold Caught Sourceless again". Columbia Journalism Review. June 13, 2006. Retrieved November 17, 2015.
  16. ↑ "Truthout reporter stands by the "Rove indicted"". Salon.com. June 13, 2006. Retrieved March 23, 2016.
  17. ↑ Karl Rove (2010). "Courage and Consequence". Threshold Editions. p. 438. Missing or empty |url= (help)
  18. ↑ Letterle, Bruce. "About Us". www.truth-out.org. Retrieved 2018-04-05.
  19. ↑ Maya Schenwar and Matt Renner (8 September 2009). "Truthout Becomes First Online-Only News Site to Unionize". Truthout.
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