GOP Opposition Research Firm Is Editing Democratic Politicians' Wikipedia Pages

America Rising’s contributions, which span thousands of words, are almost solely edits to Democratic politicians’ pages.






A Republican opposition researcher for the firm American Rising is editing Wikipedia articles of Democratic candidates.

News found the edits while browsing the edit history of politicians' pages looking for IP addresses associated with political advocacy groups.

The edits, which come from a user named "Sprinkler Court," who identifies himself as Court, always discloses that he is a researcher for America Rising.

"I am adding details of a video that surfaced of Braley making disparaging comments about Chuck Grassley. I want note that I have a COI with this edit, as I work for America Rising," reads Sprinkler Court's description of his edit to an article on Bruce Braley.

Sprinkler Court's own Talk Page on Wikipedie also identifies himself as an America Rising researcher:

Howdy, I'm Court. I've set up this account for making contributions to articles or topics on various things I'm interested in. I also ought to add that I am making contributions to articles and topics where I may have a conflict of interest or vested interest. I work for a Republican research firm called America Rising LLC in Arlington, Virginia. For total clarity, I'll always disclose potential conflicts or vested interest on Talk pages where I discuss edits using this account. My aim is to ensure that I follow all the relevant guidelines, make constructive edits and contribute productively to discussions. If you have any feedback on my editing, or would like to ask me any questions, please do leave me a note on my Talk page and I'll be happy to reply.


America Rising told News they have an "internal policy" of allowing "fact-based edits to political Wikipedia pages" that may take place "as long as the individual is 100% transparent that they work for America Rising when making those edits on page."

Here's a picture of his Sprinkler Court's user page:
























Via en.wikipedia.org











His contributions, which span thousands of words, are almost-solely edits to Democratic politicians:
























Via en.wikipedia.org




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