Ronald Dicklich, St. Louis County commissioner from Hibbing, complained that the station failed to substantiate two reports on an alleged secret plot to fire a public official when it relied on secondary, unnamed sources.
Ernest A. Lindstrom, state representative and House majority leader, complained that the newspaper was inaccurate and defamatory to him in two stories it published about alleged influence buying at the State Legislature. He claimed the paper failed to make a reasonable effort to verify the accuracy of the two stories it ran in consecutive issues. The Union Advocate is a weekly paper serving primarily organized labor in the greater St. Paul area.