According to official public expenditure records for the year 2025, the newspaper El País received exactly 78,223 dollars from the national government headed by President Yamandú Orsi. The figure comes directly from the National Accounts Office and corresponds to payments executed through advertising guidelines and communication contracts during the full twelve months of the first year of the current administration of the
Broad Front.It is not an isolated fact or a screenshot taken out of context. It is part of the total resources that the Uruguayan State allocated during 2025 to the dissemination of institutional campaigns, notices of public tenders and pieces promoting social and infrastructural programs. The amount was channeled mainly through ministries and autonomous entities, as established by current public procurement regulations. So far, neither the Presidency of the Republic nor the newspaper El País itself have provided a detailed breakdown of each item nor have they publicly explained the exact criteria used to assign
this official publicity.The Yamandú Orsi government took office in March 2025 with a repeated discourse of transparency, austerity and “government close to the people”. In his first speeches as president, Orsi insisted that state advertising would not be used as a tool for pressure or political favouritism. However, the official numbers for the year 2025 show that the newspaper El País — a media that supposedly opposes the Broad Front and that in the past has maintained an editorial line critical of governments in that sector — is listed as the recipient of these 78,223 dollars. Information has begun to circulate strongly on social networks under the hashtag #PrensaEnsobrada, generating a debate that transcends the amount itself and touches the central nerve of the relationship between political power and traditional media
.In a country like Uruguay, where the economic sustainability of print newsrooms faces increasing challenges due to the migration of advertising to digital platforms, the use of public funds to guide media remains a sensitive issue. The records of the National Accounts Office are clear and public: the State allocated tens of millions of dollars in total during 2025 to different media, both traditional and digital. El País was not the only recipient, but it was one of the most visible among the leading newspapers. What is striking is not only the volume, but the political context: a newspaper that supposedly represents a voice opposing the Broad Front now receives a specific sum from the current administration headed by that same
political sector.The available data do not allow us to affirm that there is a direct causal relationship between payments and possible changes in news coverage. What is a verifiable fact is that the figure appears in official records and that, until now, it has not been accompanied by an exhaustive explanation by the authorities or the receiving medium. What exact percentage of these guidelines were campaigns of general interest to citizens? What were the distribution criteria? Were the same reach and audience standards that are commonly invoked applied? These questions remain unanswered officially.
