Report: FTC Expands Investigation into Advertising Boycotts Against Conservative Media

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has expanded its investigation into 16 news rating organizations over alleged advertiser boycotts of center-right and conservative media, according to a report.

Adweek reported the revelation via amendments filed to a lawsuit filed in a federal court against the FTC from the Global Disinformation Index (GDI) and another organization reportedly being investigated. GDI ranks outlets based on the likeliness that they would spread disinformation.

Breitbart News reported that GDI claimed that the top ten outlets at most risk of spreading disinformation included center-right outlets such as the Federalist and the New York Post, while those labeled as the least likely to spread disinformation included HuffPost and ProPublica. A poll released in April 2025 found that Americans are losing their appetite for censorship of alleged “false” information.

Last June, FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, launched an investigation into purported collusion among media news rating groups to boycott conservative media and publishers. The FTC, charged with policing anticompetitive practices, issued many Civil Investigative Demand (CID) letters in relation to its investigations.

CIDs are similar to subpoenas, which require recipients to provide requested documents. In some of the letters issued to the news rating organizations, the government demanded information including communications, records, and financial reports.

GDI’s lawsuit alleged that the CID letter amounts to retaliation and violates the First Amendment rights by punishing protected speech.

NewsGuard, a pro-censorship group operating a blacklist against conservative media, last Friday filed suit against the FTC, arguing that the agency is trying to bankrupt it because it disagrees with its assessments of news outlets. NewsGuard portrays itself as an impartial media rating service; however, as Breitbart News has reported, its critics believe it has created a blacklist of news organizations targeted by leftists.

NewsGuard likened the FTC’s efforts to the “witch hunts of the McCarthy era,” which violates its First and Fourth Amendment rights. The FTC argues it is enforcing fair business practices, NewsGuard said that the FTC is “brazenly abusing its power not for any issue concerning trade or commerce, but rather to censor speech.”

Last June, FTC Chairman Ferguson announced that, as part of the FTC’s approval of a merger between two of the largest advertising companies, the advertising giants not to collude or discriminate based on political or ideological viewpoints.

Last summer, the FTC launched an investigation into members of the coalition of advertising groups known as the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM).

“We are disturbed by the prospect of any potentially illegal collusion in the ad market against publications that are considered conservative. The Trump-Vance FTC is working every day to make sure there are fair markets for all American,” Joe Simonson, the FTC director of public affairs, told Breitbart News in a statement.