• by Wendy Davis , Yesterday

The Federal Trade Commission has no legitimate reason to demand information from Media Matters, the left-wing advocacy group says in its latest bid to halt the agency's probe on the grounds that it violates the First Amendment.

In papers filed late Tuesday, Media Matters argues there is "ample circumstantial evidence" that the agency issued its civil investigative demand (comparable to a subpoena) "because decision makers at the agency disapproved of Media Matters' reporting and advocacy."

"This evidence includes suspicious timing, statements of animosity by FTC decision makers, pretextual reasoning for the FTC’s investigation, and the FTC’s decision not to investigate other entities that engaged in conduct similar to that which supposedly prompted its [demand] to Media Matters and other entities," the organization writes.

The new papers come in a legal battle dating to June, when Media Matters sued the FTC over its "civil investigative demand" (comparable to a subpoena) for a trove of information -- including all documents relating to the Interactive Advertising Bureau, World Federation of Advertisers and its now defunct Global Alliance for Responsible Media, Check My Ads, the Center for Countering Digital Hate, Double Verify and NewsGuard, among other groups.

Media Matters said in its complaint that the demand is a "fishing expedition into the most sensitive areas of Media Matters’ journalism and advocacy."

The group claimed that the FTC undertook the probe in retaliation for a November 2023 report about brand safety on X, formerly Twitter. Media Matters said in the report that ads for brands including Apple, Bravo, IBM and Oracle were being placed next to pro-Nazi posts on X.

The FTC recently urged U.S. District Court Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan in Washington, D.C. to dismiss Media Matters' request for several reasons.

Among other arguments, the FTC says the group's lawsuit is premature because the agency hasn't yet attempted to enforce the demand for information in court.

The commission also denied targeting Media Matters, arguing that the group is one of numerous organizations to receive demands for information regarding "potentially unlawful advertising boycotts."

Media Matters counters in its new papers that the FTC did not explain in its filing why Media Matters "would have any meaningful, relevant evidence" regarding an advertising boycott.

"The FTC has not asserted that Media Matters is a purchaser of advertisements on media platforms. Nor does the FTC claim that Media Matters has otherwise participated in any advertiser boycott conspiracy," Media Matters argues.

"The alleged possibility that Media Matters’ public reporting and advocacy inspired potential antitrust violations does not mean Media Matters possesses any information concerning those violations," the group adds. "To grant the FTC such a 'generous test' for exercising its investigatory power could subject every media outlet in the country -- from the New York Times to Fox News—to a [demand for information] each time the FTC suspects antitrust conduct was inspired by or somehow related to their reporting."

The organization also argues that the FTC's current "general campaign" against what it terms "advertiser boycotts" is actually "a politically motivated response to protected speech."

"What the Commission and Chairman Ferguson label as 'advertiser boycotts' are not the concern of antitrust laws," Media Matters contends, adding that antitrust laws "are concerned with agreements between competitors not to do business with a certain entity that are driven by financial motives, particularly to seek economic advantage."

The group continues: "Chairman Ferguson, however, has made clear that, in targeting what he calls 'advertiser boycotts,' he is actually concerned about content moderation advocacy (i.e., protected speech) and independent economic decisions made by advertisers who do not want their ads appearing next to extremist content (i.e., lawful business decisions)."

Media Matters points to several public statements by Ferguson, including an April keynote address at the 2025 Stigler Center Antitrust and Competition Conference at which he criticized online "censorship" by social media platforms.

"Consumers and content creators want a platform committed to free and open exchange of ideas," he said at that conference. "If they wanted left-wing apparatchiks to curate or inspect their ideas prior to public dissemination, they would content themselves to sit in a think tank lecture or inside a university classroom."

Media Matters adds that the FTC "did not open an investigation into conservative-leaning parties that called for boycotts, including the Daily Wire, which called for boycotts of Target and Budweiser, and Republican officials, who called for boycotts of Twitter, Facebook, and Amazon for banning President Trump from their sites."

Sooknanan will hear arguments from Media Matters and the FTC on August 13.