Americans are losing confidence in media fairness, new survey reveals

A recent Gallup poll has unveiled a striking decline in the trust that Americans place in the media.

The survey published Friday indicates that only 32 per cent of Americans now have confidence in the media’s ability to report the news fairly and accurately, marking a record low in trust, while a significant 39 per cent express complete distrust in the media.

This level of trust in the media matches the lowest point recorded in 2016, and the percentage of total distrust, at 39 per cent, sets a record. Even among Democrats, who traditionally show more trust in the media compared to Republicans, faith in the news has declined substantially over the past year, with only 58% expressing some degree of trust. This represents a notable 12-point drop from the figures recorded in 2022, a trend largely attributed to decreasing trust among younger Democrats.

The poll also found that only 11 per cent of Republicans reported having some confidence in the media establishment. However, a noteworthy observation is that the 47-point gap between respondents from the two major US political parties is the narrowest recorded since 2016 when Republicans’ trust in the establishment had seen a significant decline.

The survey sampled the opinions of 1,016 Americans during the initial two weeks of September. This marks only the second instance since Gallup began asking this question in 1972 where more Americans expressed no confidence whatsoever in the media compared to those who claimed to have a considerable or reasonable level of trust.

Even during the ‘fake news’ crisis that unfolded during the 2016 presidential election, the polled Americans were more inclined to state that they had ‘not very much’ trust in the media (41 per cent) rather than asserting ‘none at all’ (27 per cent).

In the 1970s, the portion of Americans expressing some level of trust in the media ranged between 68 per cent and 72 per cent. However, this level of trust has dwindled significantly in recent years. Since 2005, when 44 per cent of poll respondents expressed some confidence in the media establishment, fewer than half have reported trusting the media to report the news fairly and accurately.

A prior Gallup poll conducted in July revealed that just 18 per cent of respondents had confidence in newspapers, and only 16 per cent expressed confidence in television news – figures lower than those for Big Tech and the banking industry, each at 26 per cent. Consistently ranking lower were only Congress (8 per cent) and Big Business (14 per cent).

In addition, a January poll found that 42 per cent of respondents rated journalists’ ethical standards as ‘low’ or ‘very low,’ placing them above car salesmen and telemarketers but below lawyers and real estate agents. Despite growing concerns within the media industry about the public’s diminishing trust, these trends have proven challenging to reverse.