Courier’s founder, Tara McGowan, lectured Democratic strategists on how to improve their ‘media strategy’ in the wake of Harris’s loss
A Democratic dark money group that spent half a billion dollars trying to elect Kamala Harris in 2024 gave more than $13 million of that money to Courier Newsroom, liberal operative Tara McGowan’s controversial network of local “news” outlets that exist to push Democratic talking points.
Future Forward USA Action—the nonprofit arm of the premier super PAC backing Joe Biden and later Harris in the 2024 election—raised $615 million in 2024 and handed out $469 million to left-wing groups. Its fourth-largest donation—$13,597,759—was to Courier Newsroom, according to previously unreported tax filings.
Courier, which McGowan launched in 2019, operates 11 local “news” affiliates across the country. They’re designed to appear nonpartisan—Courier’s Pennsylvania site, the Keystone, features the tagline, “Pennsylvania news by and for the people of Pennsylvania”—but exist to spread positive messaging about Democrats and accept money from left-wing political entities to do so. That setup has garnered criticism from watchdogs like the Center for Responsive Politics, which labeled Courier “fake news,” and journalists like CNN’s Jake Tapper, who said Courier “is not an actual newsroom, it’s an organization funded by Democratic donors.”
The revelation over Courier’s 2024 funding comes as Democratic donors and party operatives, including McGowan, point fingers over Harris’s loss.
McGowan accused Future Forward of “political malpractice” after the group’s tax filings showed it ended 2024 with nearly $27 million on hand. Those same filings, however, show that she was one of Future Forward’s biggest beneficiaries. McGowan nonetheless briefed Democratic strategists on how to better “push progressive messages out” during a February 2025 gathering at Atlantic owner Laurene Powell Jobs’s Washington, D.C., offices, Semafor reported.
It is not immediately clear how Courier Newsroom spent the Future Forward cash infusion. Courier Newsroom and Future Forward did not respond to requests for comment.
But the Washington Free Beacon reported in November 2024 that Courier Newsroom spent $9 million in the three months leading up to the campaign on Facebook ads that boosted Harris and blasted Trump.
Running pro-Harris ads through an outfit like Courier Newsroom would have several advantages for a group like Future Forward.
Whereas Future Forward’s ads would be required to carry disclaimers that they come from the political group, Courier Newsroom’s website lists it as a “Media/news company,” leaving the impression with viewers that perhaps a legitimate and unbiased news organization viewed Harris favorably.
That’s been at the center of the debate over Courier Newsroom’s tactics, which some refer to as “pink slime journalism,” a term for partisan content presented as being objective. Brian Stelter, the liberal CNN media reporter, labeled Courier Newsroom a “pink slime” operation in 2020.
Columbia University’s Tow Center for Digital Journalism noted that Courier Newsroom faces scrutiny over its lack of transparency regarding its “historical ties to dark money groups” and “how ads are funded.”
Future Forward was the largest known funder of Courier Newsroom in 2024, according to tax filings.
Fund for Policy Reform, a think tank funded by Democratic megadonor George Soros, gave $5 million to Courier Newsroom, an amount similar to what the hedge fund billionaire contributed in previous years.
Away from Future Forward, Harris’s campaign has received its fair share of criticism over its spending practices. The campaign paid millions of dollars to celebrities and entertainers to appear alongside Harris on the campaign trail—such as the $165,000 payout the campaign gave to singer Beyoncé Knowles for a four-minute speech at a Harris event in Houston.
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