• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, February 14, 2025

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey has agreed to drop his investigation of Media Matters for America over its 2023 report stating that ads for major brands were appearing next to pro-Nazi content on X, formerly Twitter.

The attorney general's office said in court papers filed Thursday that it had not uncovered any evidence that Media Matters violated Missouri law.

The move brings an end to a legal battle dating to last year, when Bailey demanded that Media Matters turn over a trove of material related to its November 2023 report, which said ads for Apple, Bravo, IBM and Oracle were being placed next to pro-Nazi posts on Elon Musk's social platform, X.

Bailey launched the investigation soon after Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton initiated a similar probe.

Both investigations began at around the same time that X sued Media Matters over its report, alleging that the group “manipulated” X's algorithms in order to “bypass safeguards and create images of X’s largest advertisers’ paid posts adjacent to racist, incendiary content.”

Media Matters sued to block investigations by both attorneys general, arguing that they aimed to chill the watchdog's reporting, which is protected by the First Amendment.

Last year, U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta ordered both states to halt their investigations. Paxton and Bailey appealed those orders to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Bailey officially withdrew that appeal on Thursday.

The appellate court heard arguments on Paxton's appeal in November, and has not yet issued a ruling.