Democratic Dark Money, the Influencer Economy and Sam Rosenholtz with Lindsay Lee Wallace

As news outlets are being banned from the White House let's talk about the Democratic dark money funding influencers positioning themselves as journalists. Actual Journalist Lindsay Lee Wallace returns to the show to unpack dark money in social media influencing, and the social media economy. Lindsay talks about the there isn't a code of ethics for influencers, people aren't required to be experts in their field and what this means for journalism.

We talk about how Jessica became the subject of a social media video from Sam Rosenholtz, an influencer who is funded by the Democratic dark money non profit Chorus and has been paid for engaging in Denver politics. Rosenholtz is a white guy with 1.4M Instagram followers, and used a video of Jessica dressed as her conservative alter-ego as his hook to get people to pay attention to him talking about cyclospora.

Today Lindsay and Jessica connect Rosenholtz and his video to the state of our news and journalism landscape and we also discuss that being the subject of Rosenholtz's video made Jessica care more about Democratic political spending, something that was way overdue.

Sam Rosenholtz is part of the Chorus Creator Collection and you can buy his favorite saying

Sam involved in Denver bond measure

Comer Launches Investigation into Sixteen Thirty Fund's Reported Secretive Chorus Program, Effort to Evade Campaign Finance Laws

We're living through an explainer epidemic | Dazed

'The Least Transparent Midterm': How Dark Money Is Washing Over the 2026 Election - The New York Times

Influencers Have a Lot to Say About Politics. Many Are Quietly Paid for It. - The New York Times

Influencers trying to self-regulate their political involvement

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Follow Jessica Wilson on Instagram @jessicawilson.msrd

Jessica Wilson's book: It's Always Been Ours; Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies

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