Who Funds AI Critics? How Tarbell Fellows Sparked a Media Fight Over AI Coverage

Last month NBC News reported that OpenAI had issued legal threats to nonprofit organizations that criticized the company’s work on artificial intelligence. OpenAI’s complaint, however, focused less on the substance of the reporting than on who funded the reporter behind the story.

The company privately raised concerns with NBC that the journalist had been supported by the Tarbell Center for AI Journalism, a fellowship that places early-career reporters inside established newsrooms for months to cover AI and its societal impact. After the private complaint, NBC appended a disclosure noting Tarbell’s funding links, including donations from groups such as the Future of Life Institute.

The Tarbell fellowship has since become a new battleground in a widening ideological dispute over AI. On one side are accelerationists — technologists, investors, and industry allies who favor rapid development and argue private companies can manage safety while remaining competitive. On the other are skeptics and safety advocates, including many aligned with the effective altruism movement, who press for stronger guardrails and public oversight.

That split has played out inside OpenAI — where founders with effective-altruism backgrounds once sought leadership changes — and in Washington, where the Trump administration has pursued industry-friendlier AI policies compared with the Biden White House. Now the contest increasingly centers on how mainstream newsrooms cover AI, and on whether external funding for reporters creates real or perceived editorial bias.

How The Tarbell Model Works

Launched in 2022, the Tarbell Center says it funds early-career technology journalists to "help society navigate the emergence of increasingly advanced AI." Its fellows have been hosted at outlets including Time, Bloomberg, The Verge, The Los Angeles Times and The Information. Participating newsrooms and Tarbell say fellows work under newsroom editors and retain full editorial independence.

“The Tarbell Center exists to support rigorous and independent accountability journalism. We maintain a strict firewall between our funding and our fellows’ editorial output,” said Cillian Crosson, Tarbell’s executive director.

Tarbell’s donors include a mix of foundations and philanthropies, among them groups that have publicly raised concerns about AI risks. One such funder, Open Philanthropy, has recently rebranded parts of its work under the name Coefficient Giving.

Why Funders And Fellows Are Contested

Critics — including some accelerationists and industry allies — say the model risks introducing externally funded perspectives into newsrooms and creating the appearance of bias. Supporters counter that independent fellowships help cash-strapped newsrooms hire ambitious reporters to cover one of the defining stories of the decade and that editorial control always rests with the host newsroom.

Observers note a sharper public posture from OpenAI over the past year, pointing to changes in Sam Altman’s public tone and the company’s hiring of seasoned political and communications operatives to influence state and federal policy. Pro-development advocates have also pushed back in media spaces, attempting to highlight perceived influence by safety-focused actors on policymakers.

For newsrooms already facing financial pressures, fellowships like Tarbell’s offer tangible benefits: coverage capacity, expertise, and occasional scoops. But at a moment of low public trust in media, editors may also consider the optics of hosting reporters funded by organizations with explicit positions on AI.

As the contest over AI policy and public understanding intensifies, funding and funding transparency for journalism will likely remain central to debates about media credibility and accountability. Whatever side one takes in the policy debate, the stakes for public trust in reporting on transformative technology are clear.