The Univisión-Televisa conglomerate has made a deal with a left-wing coalition financed in part by George Soros to purchase 18 Spanish-language radio stations around the country, reports revealed this week – including historic anti-communist Miami station Radio Mambí.
The purchase, which still requires FCC approval, is an attempt to stem the tide of Hispanic-Americans voting for Republicans based on cultural conservative values and a growing disdain for the failed presidency of Joe Biden – or, as one of the executives in charge of the purchase described it, to combat “disinformation.”
If approved, the deal would put the 18 radio stations in the hands of a newly minted left-wing organization called the “Latino Media Network,” headed by alums of the Obama White House and advocacy groups tied to Mark Zuckerberg. While the Cuban-American community in Miami has reacted with alarm – Cuban exile leaders have scheduled a press conference on Wednesday at the Bay of Pigs Museum to express “great concern” at the situation – the attempt appears to be a retread of Univisión’s initial attempt at selling left-leaning talk radio to Hispanic Americans. Univisión, whose news broadcasts tend to promote leftist viewpoints, initially attempted to turn many of the AM radio stations into talk news outlets, but ultimately gave up on the plan and switched to music in 2015.
Florida’s WLRN-FM reported late last week that the “Latino Media Network” had “signed a ‘definitive agreement’ to buy the stations for $60 million. The media startup has launched after raising an initial $80 million.” The station confirmed the news with Univisión.
“Latinos are constantly trying to navigate the ocean of information. In some cases that is disinformation, in some cases that is very one-sided communication,” Stephanie Valencia, the former Obama outreach director co-running the Latino Media Network, told the radio station. “In the Latino community radio still plays such an important part, and in places like Florida it obviously plays a critically important part.”
Valencia is running the new network with Jess Morales Rocketto, who WLRN described as a “Democratic activist.” Morales Rocketto ran the Families Belong Together immigrant advocacy group, tied to Mark Zuckerberg’s FWD.us.
Vice President Kamala Harris, right, speaks during the ceremonial swearing-in of Ken Salazar, left, as ambassador to Mexico, while Salazar’s former press secretary Stephanie Valencia, center, holds a Bible, in the Vice President’s Ceremonial Office in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on the White House complex in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 2, 2021. (Susan Walsh/AP)
Multiple reports in Spanish-language media confirmed that Latino Media Network raised $80 million to buy the 18 radio stations. Among the investors are actress Eva Longoria and an investment fund called Lakestar Finance, tied to the Soros Fund Management. Soros’s investments in left-wing causes have made him an unpopular figure among Hispanic Americans and, in particular, on Spanish-language radio. In 2019, a controversy erupted after Radio Martí – a United States government station aimed at Cuba akin to Radio Free Europe – published a report on Soros condemned as “anti-Semitic,” resulting in mass firings at the broadcaster.
The purchase of Radio Mambí, a historic anti-communist radio station in Miami, has triggered particular alarm among Hispanic listeners. Radio Mambí, named after the machete-wielding freedom fighters in the Cuban war of independence against Spain, was founded in 1985 to give a voice to the Cuban exile community and became one of Miami’s most listened-to talk radio stations.
While extremely popular at its peak, the Univisión purchase of Radio Mambí collapsed listenership after a mass exodus of its top talent in 2017.
“It was very shocking,” former host Bernadette Pardo, who Univisión laid off, said at the time. “I’ve been there for 30 years, and we were doing fine in the ratings.”
Prior to the collapse of Univisión-run Radio Mambí, the media giant canceled much of its talk radio content in 2015 after attempting to restructure it. As Newsbusters noted this weekend, “the former Univision America launched and folded at a time when Hispanics trusted their media institutions and the sitting Democrat president enjoyed the support of over 70% of Hispanics.”
Today, Biden is receiving record-low approval ratings from Hispanic Americans and is more unpopular with them than with white Americans.
Following the announcement of the left-wing radio station shopping spree, members of the Cuban exile community and conservatives in Florida expressed special concern for Radio Mambí. The Assembly of the Cuban Resistance, a coalition of pro-democracy groups on and off the island, issued a statement announcing a press conference on Wednesday to amplify the “community’s great concern that iconic radio stations of advocacy for Cuba’s freedom and fundamental rights for the Cuban people not be silenced as a result of potential corporate sale.”
Cuban-American Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) condemned the purchase as a “leftist plan to wipe out Hispanic conservative voices.”
Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) listens during the Senate Small Business and Entrepreneurship Hearings on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on June 10, 2020. (AL DRAGO/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
The executive director of the Republican Party of Florida, Helen Aguirre Ferré, wrote in a statement on Twitter that the proposed buy “confirms the importance of the fight Hispanics are waging against Marxist ideology in Florida.”
Ferré, who once worked at Radio Mambí, added, “the hastily arranged takeover of Radio Mambí shines a light to what lengths socialist interests will go to advance their agenda on America.”
Valencia, the Latino Media Network head, confirmed in her remarks to WLRN that Radio Mambí would make a pivot to her definition of “balanced journalism,” but claimed that the station would not become a leftist propaganda outlet.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis announced an ad buy on two of the stations included in the deal, one of them being Radio Mambí, to warn listeners that Soros-backed interests will likely reshape the ideology of their preferred talk radio stations.
“Governor Ron DeSantis is taking [on] Soros on his own turf with a Spanish language ad buy on the Soros network, serving as a PSA to Hispanic Floridians to warn of the pro-socialism, radical agenda behind The Latino Media Network,” a statement the DeSantis campaign provided to Fox News Digital on Monday reads.
According to the outlet, the ads will state in Spanish, “Warning, voters! The Left is taking control of our local media. Billionaire George Soros, known for financing extreme leftist causes, is now financing the purchase of Hispanic radio stations right here in Miami.”