I keep my news, investigations, and analysis free and accessible to everyone. If you value my work, your support makes it possible for me to keep doing it. Please like, comment, share, and subscribe.
Gloria Steinem, the woman many credit as the “Founder of Feminism,” died on September 2, 2026.
And I’m already seeing the tributes pour in about what a “trailblazing feminist” she was and everything she supposedly did for women around the world.
Funny how so many of those tributes are leaving out her relationship with what I consider to be the largest terrorist organization in the world: the CIA.
Steinem called the CIA “nonviolent,” “liberal,” and “honorable.” She never apologized for her association with them and said she would do it again. The same CIA that overthrew governments, propped up dictators, murdered dissidents, conducted drug experiments on children, and aligned itself with the most oppressive regimes in the world. Its interventions led to severe and systematic repression of women in countries all around the world, while CIA personnel themselves used sexual violence as a method of coercion. Within the CIA’s own ranks, women faced rampant sexual harassment. And the agency itself systematically discriminated against women.
…but sure, tell me again about Gloria Steinem, the trailblazing feminist who stood up for women around the world.
Seems like a pretty important contradiction to leave out of all these glowing tributes.
So I’m here to fill in the holes.
I keep my news, investigations, and analysis free and accessible to everyone. If you value my work, your support makes it possible for me to keep doing it. Please like, comment, share, and subscribe.
Steinem and the CIA
Nobody with the interests of society at heart would be trying to divide men and women against each other. There is nothing more important to the foundation of a society than the family unit.
Steinem was recruited into the CIA by officers C.D. Jackson and Cord Meyer. She then “founded” and “directed” the Independent Research Service, a CIA front organization used to send American students to the 1959 World Youth Festival in Vienna and the 1962 Helsinki festival during the Cold War.
And the CIA wasn’t some distant connection quietly lurking in the background. Her operation was funded almost entirely by the agency, including approximately $85,000 for Vienna alone. Steinem ran the organization from 1959 to 1962 and remained on its board as late as 1969.
Then, in a 1967 interview, Steinem admitted that she knew exactly who was backing the surveillance operation: the CIA.
And instead of that relationship destroying her credibility or sending her career into obscurity like you might expect, the exact opposite happened.
Gloria Steinem’s career exploded.
One year after the CIA revelations became public, Steinem was suddenly propelled into national prominence. Clay Felker, the publisher of New York Magazine, backed her rise and later helped launch Ms. Magazine in 1971.
And then the money started pouring in.
One of the major early investors was Katharine Graham, the owner of The Washington Post and Newsweek, who put up $20,000 before the magazine had even launched.
Years later, while giving a speech at CIA headquarters in 1988, Graham made this infamous statement about government secrecy and the role of the press:
We live in a dirty and dangerous world. There are some things the general public does not need to know, and shouldn't. I believe democracy flourishes when the government can take legitimate steps to keep its secrets and when the press can decide whether to print what it knows.
—Katharine Graham, “Secrecy and the Press,” delivered at CIA headquarters to new recruits
Think about how extraordinary that is coming from one of the most powerful media figures in America. Katharine Graham owned The Washington Post and Newsweek, helped bankroll Steinem’s “feminist” magazine, and then stood inside CIA headquarters openly defending the idea that there were things the American public “does not need to know” and that the press could decide to keep what it knows from us.
And by “the press could decide,” she’s talking about the very journalists working hand-in-hand with the CIA under Operation Mockingbird.
And this was one of the women helping finance Gloria Steinem.
Then came Warner Communications, which poured nearly $1 million into Ms. Magazine while taking only 25% of the stock. By normal media investment standards, this was an incredibly bizarre deal. And wouldn’t you know it, Warner also happened to own Wonder Woman comics, which Ms. Magazine would go on to aggressively promote.
CIA money. Media money. Corporate money. All flowing through the same increasingly interconnected circle around America’s shiny new feminist icon.
With corporate money and the backing of some of the most powerful people in American media, Ms. Magazine became the face of mainstream feminism.
This is why Ms. Magazine never challenged U.S. foreign policy or the CIA, an agency with a documented history of committing some of the most horrific abuses against human beings, especially women and children, around the world.
And it’s also why, despite Steinem’s history with that agency, she was allowed to remain a celebrated feminist icon instead of being confronted for what she was: an operative whose career aligned perfectly with U.S. geopolitical interests, while selling out the very women she claimed to represent.
I keep my news, investigations, and analysis free and accessible to everyone. If you value my work, your support makes it possible for me to keep doing it. Please like, comment, share, and subscribe.
Steinem and Stanley Pottinger
For ten years, Gloria Steinem was in a relationship with Stanley Pottinger while he was running guns during the Iran-Contra affair along with Jeffrey Epstein himself.
Ah, yes. What a staunch defender of women, running in the same circles as a pedophile and trafficker of women and young girls.
Steinem and Israel
Steinem was also a committed Zionist who consistently defended Israeli aggression.
In 1975, women from countries all over the world condemned Zionism at the UN’s first World Conference on Women in Mexico City. And what did this supposed champion of women do? She went after the women.
Steinem spent her career telling women they deserved a voice, but when women used that voice to condemn Israel, suddenly she had a problem with it.
And this is something people desperately need to understand about so many of these public figures: they don’t actually believe the shit they preach to you. Their morals are for sale. Their principles last exactly as long as their donors allow them to. They’ll protect the “right” people, abandon everything they supposedly stand for, and then get back in front of a camera and sell you the same carefully manufactured BS image all over again.
Steinem, just like the Zionists today, subordinated everything she professed to believe (the agency of women) in order to uphold the genocidal Jewish State of Israel.
We’re watching people do this exact same thing right now.
There are people who have spent their entire careers screaming about being “pro-life” who will turn around and staunchly defend Israel while thousands of children are being killed in the genocide in Gaza.
Tell me, did you know about Steinem’s connections to the CIA?
And who else spent years building a public image while quietly working with the CIA behind the scenes? How many people have we been told were independent journalists or activists, only to find out later that the CIA was somewhere in the background?
Relevant reading:
If you’re tired of being told everything is fine while it clearly isn’t, you’re exactly why this publication exists.
My work is 100% reader-supported. That means no advertisers, no political handlers, and no incentive to soften the truth.
I started this because too many people feel like they’re losing their minds trying to make sense of what’s happening, myself included. I wanted to build a space of like-minded people to make this journey feel less lonely for all of us.
To allow me to continue posting content just like this, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. I’m running a special for $40/year or $5/month.
If that price feels impossible to you, I understand. Share this article with everyone you know, it costs nothing but it matters more than you could possibly know.
I keep my news, investigations, and analysis free and accessible to everyone. If you value my work, your support makes it possible for me to keep doing it. Please like, comment, share, and subscribe.
@Jarret Sharp 🫡
Thanks for covering this Maddie. I'm always staunchly defending women however I never call myself a feminist and won't be called a feminist. Feminists want a place at the man's table. I want us to build a new table - with men AND women. Those I speak to won't have it. They love the political system and praise that women hold high office. But really all those women do is perpetuate patriarchy. Politics, finance, education, just about everything we can think of is all exclusively male-designed.