At a top Florida news site, politicians, lobbyists and consultants say they pay to secure flattering coverage. Now the founder of the site, Florida Politics, is expanding to states throughout the southeast.
Tracy J. Lee for NPR
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Tracy J. Lee for NPR
At a top Florida news site, politicians, lobbyists and consultants say they pay to secure flattering coverage. Now the founder of the site, Florida Politics, is expanding to states throughout the southeast.
Tracy J. Lee for NPR
This story was reported by NPR’s David Folkenflik and Miranda Green of Floodlight, a nonprofit newsroom that investigates the powerful interests stalling climate action.
Political strategist Eunic Epstein-Ortiz arrived in Florida from New York in 2017 to help a major labor union turn out voters for the following year. She recalls being pleasantly surprised by the positive coverage the campaign received from Florida Politics.
The website is Florida’s answer to Politico: It illuminates developments on politics and policy for insiders and news buffs, and it influences what other outlets report about the state. And it reflects the drive of its founder, Peter Schorsch.
“He will determine whether or not something is news in the state of Florida,” Epstein-Ortiz says.
By her telling, her pleasure soon curdled. Schorsch emailed to ask the union to buy advertising on the site. She declined, as the union was not seeking to reach the website’s core audience of state lobbyists and…
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