{"id":848,"date":"2026-07-02T10:10:49","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T10:10:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=848"},"modified":"2026-07-02T10:10:49","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T10:10:49","slug":"dark-money-group-paid-democrat-janelle-stelson-for-disappearing-podcast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=848","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Dark Money\u2019 Group Paid Democrat Janelle Stelson for Disappearing Podcast"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Janelle Stelson, a former local news anchor who Democrats are hoping will unseat Republican Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pennsylvania) this November in one of the nation\u2019s hottest House races<\/u><\/span>, was to produce a podcast that no longer exists online, federal records show.<\/p>\n

Read more Trump and America\u2019s 250th Overshadow the Republican Tax Cuts Anniversary<\/a><\/p>\n

Stelson was paid $45,000 between January 2024 and October 2025 by Voting for America to produce four episodes of \u201cVoices of Central Pennsylvania With Janelle Stelson,\u201d according to her 2025 financial disclosure report. the organization, which has ties to Democrats, reported less than $50,000 in total income in 2025.<\/p>\n

show that Voting for America was founded in June 2024 and led by three alumni of the Democratic National Committee and House Democrats\u2019 campaign arm, alongside a political lawyer.<\/p>\n

Mara Kunin, a Democratic operative listed as the organization\u2019s principal on its tax records, did not respond to a request for comment from NOTUS.<\/p>\n

The podcast series appears on only one audio platform<\/u><\/span>, Podchaser, and the four episodes taped by Stelson and published in 2025 are not playable due to an \u201cerror in episode file\u201d or an \u201cepisode file missing.\u201d<\/p>\n

NOTUS obtained recordings of the four podcasts, which were each roughly 20 minutes long and featured interviews by Stelson with people with connections to Pennsylvania who weretackling issues such as Medicaid cuts and job losses among union workers.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs an award winning anchor, Janelle had the opportunity in 2025 to record a short series of podcasts that once again gave her an outlet to uplift her own community and shine a light on the issues that people are facing,\u201d a spokesperson for Stelson\u2019s campaign told NOTUS.<\/p>\n

A person familiar with Stelson\u2019s work on the podcast told NOTUS that she is no longer paying the server\u2019s fee to keep the podcast online.<\/p>\n

The campaign did not answer questions from NOTUS about why Stelson did not list the podcast publicly on a free hosting site such as SoundCloud. But the campaign clarified that the podcasts were previously listed on Spotify and Apple.<\/p>\n

Read more Which College Majors Have the Best (and Worst) Career Paths?<\/a><\/p>\n

Michael Beckel, the director of money in politics at Issue One, a nonpartisan political reform organization, told NOTUS that the circumstances behind the podcast and payment seem murky.<\/p>\n

While Stelson is a respected former news anchor, and it\u2019s not uncommon for a Democratic group to work with someone like her on a podcast series, a lack of information about the funding organization and its spending raises some questions, Beckel said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s certainly a stream of revenue that helps her continue to share news with fellow Pennsylvanians, or share information,\u201d Beckel said. \u201cBut it\u2019s very unclear from public records alone who was behind Voting for America and what types of pet policies they might be pushing for if she\u2019s elected to Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n

This is Stelson\u2019s second bid for Congress after she failed to oust Perry in 2024. <\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

Her federal financial disclosure forms show the podcast was a meaningful portion of her income in 2025 \u2013\u2013 her campaign committee also paid her about $19,000 and a political analytics group paid her about $15,000 in consulting fees. Stelson also reported earning around $45,000 from her retirement plan in 2025.<\/p>\n

She disclosed no earned income other than her nearly $130,000 salary as a news reporter in the she filed ahead of her 2024 bid against Perry.<\/p>\n

Beckel said that regardless of the podcast\u2019s status, it\u2019s important to understand \u201cwhat other business relationships and background and pledges and priorities that candidate is bringing to the table.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Prosecutors to Review More Than 1,000 Cases After Broadview Six Debacle<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rep. Scott Perry\u2019s challenger disclosed $45,000 in earned income from a Democratic-aligned organization established in D.C.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":847,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-2026-election"],"yoast_head":"\n\u2018Dark Money\u2019 Group Paid Democrat Janelle Stelson for Disappearing Podcast - Modern Home Journals<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/modernhomejournals.com\/?p=848\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u2018Dark Money\u2019 Group Paid Democrat Janelle Stelson for Disappearing Podcast - Modern Home Journals\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Rep. 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