Keep Rupert Murdoch From Meddling in National Geographic

National Geographic just issued a response to our petition, but stopped short of appointing a Public Editor. With a feature issue on climate change hitting newsstands next month, the threat Rupert Murdoch poses to the future of the brand couldn’t be more urgent – the next four weeks could be a make-or-break moment for the future of one of the the world’s most trusted voices on climate change.

Last week, senior executives told us that they pay close attention to the views of readers, and that so far they haven’t heard a lot of concerns – but like most people, most National Geographic readers don’t even know about the deal, or the threat posed by Rupert Murdoch. So this week, we produced a radio ad designed to reach National Geographic readers, and now we need to raise the funds to run it on the stations where they’ll be listening.

Listen to the radio ad and chip in $15 to help us put it on the air.

Some say we’re asking for too little too late, but public editors have investigated and reported on reader complaints at dozens of leading outlets including the New York Times and PBS – providing a forum for public accountability. And with final arrangements of the merger with 21st Century Fox still to be worked out, there’s no better time to be demanding accountability.

In its response to our petition, National Geographic points to statements by 21st Century Fox CEO, James Murdoch, in which he's said that he's not interested in interfering with editorial decisions at National Geographic. But he is only three months into his tenure as CEO, and it remains to be seen whether he will be able to keep his climate-change-denying-father, who continues to serve as chairman, from influencing how the deal with National Geographic plays out.

National Geographic also says shared board governance and various agreements between the companies will prevent any interference in National Geographic’s editorial direction. But Rupert Murdoch has a history of evading such agreements–most notably at the Wall Street Journal where he famously replaced senior executives with those of his choosing despite his assurances to the contrary prior finalizing his purchase of the paper.