Congressional District 2 Democrats Falsely Claim that Young Republicans of Oregon Took Over Jim Doherty’s Facebook Page “To Sow Disinformation”

The 2nd Congressional District Committee of the Democratic Party of Oregon recently posted on Facebook that they intend to highlight what they determine to be right wing “propaganda” social media profiles. Their first target: Common Sense Eastern Oregon, the recently renamed campaign page of former Morrow County Commissioner Jim Doherty. While Doherty ultimately lost to incumbent State Representative Greg Smith in the primary in part due to Rep. Smith’s support from Young Republicans of Oregon, CD2 Democrats now falsely claim that Young Republicans took over Doherty’s page to “sow disinformation.”

As we approach the midterms, we want to highlight potential groups that will seek to sow disinformation or unacknowledged bias to our broader community’s discussion.

The group we would like to highlight today is Common Sense Eastern Oregon. There are several key features to look out for aiding in identification.

First, this group changed from an earlier name, in this case ‘Jim Doherty For State Representative’, when it was time to deploy the propaganda. This means it’s not a brand new account, giving it more privileges, and they can delete or hide all existing posts. They can salvage any followers from the previous page and slyly join people’s feeds with their perspective and bias shrouded.

Second, they are following only Republican accounts which can show which groups are running the account or are influencing their voice. This is found under the followers->following page and this one has the Young Republicans of Oregon (a likely owner/manager of the page) plastered all over it.

This information is publicly available, however, you may have to access it in a private window for certain pieces, like page transparency, to load.

We hope this is informative and please let us know any other pages or groups to investigate so we can all stay aware of these misinformation/bias projection campaigns.

Right Now Oregon has previously covered inflammatory remarks by CD2 Democrats, including mocking late Republican Congressman Doug LaMalfa after his death and condemning Congressman Cliff Bentz, a practicing Catholic, for participating in a bipartisan religious gathering in Washington, DC.

Young Republicans of Oregon unequivocally rejected the claim:

“The YRO is not apart of Jim Doherty’s Facebook and never has been. After attacking members of our organization over the last year, we would never support someone who treats young Republicans this way.”

The 2nd Congressional District Democratic Committee, CD2 Democratic nominee Chris Beck, and Jim Doherty did not respond to a request for comment.