Texas attorney general Ken Paxton launched an investigation into Media Matters for “potential fraudulent activity” after one of the liberal media watchdog’s reports prompted multiple corporations to pull their advertising from X.
The announcement came Monday hours after X filed a “thermonuclear lawsuit” in Texas, alleging Media Matters manipulated data on Elon Musk’s rebranded social-media platform to intentionally mislead advertisers. Musk, who owns X, slammed the media watchdog’s story that claimed ads from top corporate brands were running alongside “white nationalist” and “pro-Nazi content.”
In response to the Media Matters story, IBM, Apple, Disney, Lionsgate Entertainment, Sony, and other major firms boycotted the platform over their ads supposedly appearing next to the antisemitic posts.
Paxton was “extremely troubled by the allegations,” according to his office, and is investigating whether Media Matters “fraudulently manipulated data” to portray X in a negative light.
“We are examining the issue closely to ensure that the public has not been deceived by the schemes of radical left-wing organizations who would like nothing more than to limit freedom by reducing participation in the public square,” Paxton said in a press release.
“Under the Texas Business Organizations Code and the Deceptive Trade Practices Act, the OAG will vigorously enforce against nonprofits who commit fraudulent acts in or affecting the state of Texas,” his office stated.
X’s lawsuit claims Media Matters “knowingly and maliciously manufactured side-by-side images depicting advertisers’ posts” on the social-media platform “beside Neo-Nazi and white-nationalist fringe content.” It said the reporting misrepresented the user experience “with the intention of harming X and its business.”
According to the lawsuit, Media Matters employees created fake accounts, followed 30 specific users, and constantly refreshed their feeds to generate “between 13 and 15 times more advertisements per hour than viewed by the average X user” until major brand ads appeared next to fringe posts.
“That is, 100% of the accounts Media Matters followed were either fringe accounts or were accounts for national large brands,” the lawsuit read. “In all, this functioned as an attempt to flood the Media Matters account with content only from national brands and fringe figures, tricking the algorithm into thinking Media Matters wanted to view both hateful content and content from large advertisers.”
The suit was filed in Texas because Media Matters’ report harmed the platform’s “significant business” with advertisers in the state, which contains millions of users and holds some of the company’s offices. There are over 500 million active users per month on X.
Republican Missouri attorney general Andrew Bailey posted Sunday on X that he is also “looking into this matter.”