An Obama administration official advocates for free 2024 election coverage for all, in a paywalled article.

A former high-ranking official from the Obama administration, who previously worked for TIME Magazine, stated in a recently published op-ed that the survival of democracy hinged on news outlets providing free coverage of the 2024 election this year.

Richard Stengel, a former TIME managing editor and Obama State Department staff member, argued in The Atlantic that online paywalls hinder the public's ability to access accurate information. He contended that consumers will eventually find ways to circumvent paying for news coverage and will instead turn to free, low-quality "misinformation."

"Paywalls create a two-tiered system: credible, fact-based information for those who pay, and murky, less-reliable information for everyone else," he wrote. "It is a terrible time for the press to be failing at reaching people, during an election in which democracy is at stake. A simple, temporary solution is for publications to suspend their paywalls for all 2024 election coverage and all information that benefits voters. Democracy does not die in darkness—it dies behind paywalls."

According to Stengel, a study by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism revealed that 75% of top American news organizations charge for access to their journalism.

"What is the reaction of American news consumers to paywalls? Almost 80 percent of Americans avoid them and look for free alternatives, according to Stengel. He also pointed out that the issue is not just that professionally produced news is behind a paywall, but that paywalls increase the proportion of free and easily accessible stories that are filled with misinformation and disinformation."

Stengel, who worked for Obama and was the lead official for the USAGM during the Biden-Harris transition, did not mention Trump in his piece but made his political loyalties clear.

During a challenging period for digital media, with numerous layoffs occurring in the industry recently, Stengel pointed out that about one-third of U.S. newspapers have stopped publishing in the past two decades. Meanwhile, "disinformation" researcher Paul Barrett informed Stengel that news organizations seeking to monetize their content may inadvertently aid "fake news operations."

""Traditional news-gathering businesses are struggling financially and may unintentionally be benefiting fake news operations that prioritize clickbait or ideological bias," he explained to me."

Paywalls have likely contributed to the decline in public trust in the media, as observed in the 21st century. However, newspapers that have made their content free have seen an increase in subscriptions, indicating that readers value their coverage.

Stengel's piece was behind a paywall at The Atlantic, which one X user pointed out, and Stengel himself admitted.

"To effectively tackle these challenges, newsrooms should remove or temporarily lift their paywalls for stories related to the 2024 election, as argued by him. Despite the irony of making this request behind The Atlantic's own paywall, this is where the argument should be made."

Although some paywall media outlets are left-leaning, such as Stengel's own TIME Magazine, the New York Times, The Washington Post and others, he suggested that most of them were unbiased.

"The reason many Americans perceive media as biased is that most unbiased, accurate, and fair news is hidden behind a paywall. Consequently, the free content doesn't have to be truthful, impartial, or unbiased. Disinformationists, conspiracy theorists, and Russian and Chinese troll farms don't employ fact-checkers, libel lawyers, or copy editors."

Stengel now serves as a political analyst at left-wing cable outlet MSNBC.

Besides Stengel, other former TIME employees have held significant positions in the Obama administration, including Jay Carney, who served as the Washington bureau chief before becoming the director of communications for Vice President Biden and eventually President Obama's second press secretary.

The Atlantic declined to comment on whether it would follow Stengel's advice and offer free journalism.

Planet Chronicle' Michael Ruiz contributed to this report.