National Enquirer, caught in ‘catch-and-kill’ scandal, sold

The National Enquirer, the scandal-plagued tabloid that engaged in “catch-and-kill” practices to bury tales about Donald Trump throughout his presidential marketing campaign, has been bought.

VVIP is shopping for the National Examiner and one other tabloid, the Globe, from journal writer a360 Media in an all-cash deal, although actual monetary phrases weren’t disclosed.

In December 2018 the mother or father firm of publications together with the National Enquirer, Us Weekly and In Touch admitted to participating in a journalistically doubtful observe often called “catch-and-kill” to be able to assist Donald Trump develop into U.S. president.

Federal prosecutors revealed on the time that they’d agreed to not prosecute American Media Inc. for secretly helping Trump’s marketing campaign by paying US$150,000 to Playboy mannequin Karen McDougal for the rights to her story about an alleged affair with Trump. The firm then deliberately suppressed McDougal’s story till after the election.

Jeff Bezos, the founding father of Amazon, additionally accused the paper of trying to bribe him in 2019 with embarrassing “below the belt” images despatched to his girlfriend.

American Media bought the National Enquirer and another publications in April 2019 to James Cohen, former head of the airport newsstand firm Hudson News. However, the transaction was by no means accomplished.

In August 2020 David Pecker stepped down as CEO of American Media. At the time, American Media Inc. was being taken over by Accelerate360, a logistics agency primarily based in Smyrna, Georgia. Under Pecker, the National Enquirer for years buried probably embarrassing tales about Trump and different favoured celebrities by shopping for the rights to them and by no means publishing.

The Federal Election Commission fined a360 Media $187,500 in June 2021 for squashing the McDougal story. The FEC stated the writer’s “payment to Karen McDougal to purchase a limited life story right combined with its decision not to publish the story, in consultation with an agent of Donald J. Trump and for the purpose of influencing the election, constituted a prohibited corporate in-kind contribution.”

VVIP Ventures is a three way partnership between digital media and content material applied sciences holding firm Vinco Ventures Inc. and ICON Publishing.