Gallup: Trust In The Media Crashes To Historic Low

Gallup’s latest survey on Americans’ trust in the mass media paints a stark picture: confidence in newspapers, television, and radio has hit a historic low.

Only 28% of U.S. adults now say they have a “great deal” or a “fair amount” of trust that news outlets report fully, accurately, and fairly. That’s down from 31% last year and a steep fall from 40% just five years ago. In contrast, roughly seven in ten adults express little to no confidence, with 36% saying “not very much” and 34% saying “none at all.” This is the first time Gallup has recorded trust dipping below 30% since it began tracking the metric in the 1970s, when roughly 70% of Americans expressed confidence in the news.

The decline is pervasive across political affiliations. Republicans’ confidence, already weak, has plunged to single digits for the first time, with only 8% expressing trust. Independents remain skeptical at 27%, matching last year’s record low. Even Democrats, historically the most trusting, register a narrow majority of 51%, echoing lows last seen in 2016. Generational divisions further underscore the crisis: adults 65 and older retain relatively higher trust at 43%, while younger Americans across all party lines rarely exceed 28%.

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These survey results come amid repeated high-profile media failures. The New York Times’ false Gaza hospital story in 2023, which relied solely on a Palestinian source, highlighted a pattern of insufficient verification. Similarly, reporting on Vice President Kamala Harris’ alleged plagiarism was criticized for deliberately underrepresenting the scope of the issue, contrasting sharply with how the Times covered similar Republican controversies.

In October, President Donald Trump filed a $15 billion defamation suit against The New York Times. In the suit, Trump accused the Times of printing false and defamatory statements about his business career that damaged his professional reputation.

The Media Research Center’s October 2025 analysis of network coverage during the government shutdown adds another layer: ABC, CBS, and NBC reportedly framed Democrats favorably while heavily criticizing Republicans, with 87% of coverage skewed toward Democratic talking points and only twelve instances of criticism directed at Democrats.