The Trump administration’s FTC, an independent government agency, has just opened an investigation into Media Matters for coordinating advertising boycotts of Elon Musk’s X platform.

Here’s more via Axios:

The Federal Trade Commission is investigating the liberal group Media Matters over claims that it and other media advocacy groups coordinated advertising boycotts of Elon Musk’s X, Media Matters president Angelo Carusone confirmed in a statement Thursday.

Musk and conservatives have been targeting advertising groups for months as part of a broader effort to determine whether the ad market writ large is biased against them.

X sued Media Matters for defamation in 2023 for a report it publicly released that showed ads on X running next to pro-Nazi content. X claimed the report contributed to an advertiser exodus.

Last year, X filed a federal antitrust lawsuit against the World Federation of Advertisers, a major advertising trade group, and its industry coalition called the Global Alliance for Responsible Media.

The lawsuit proved effective as WFA discontinued GARM a few months later.

“The Trump administration has been defined by naming right-wing media figures to key posts and abusing the power of the federal government to bully political opponents and silence critics,” said Carusone.

“It’s clear that’s exactly what’s happening here, given Media Matters’ history of holding those same figures to account. These threats won’t work; we remain steadfast to our mission.”

The FTC did not respond to a request for comment.

Media Matters has been coordinating these boycotts, based on lies, against the right for decades and it’s time that comes to a stop. I hope the FTC does something significant here.