Pew: Americans’ Trust in National and Local News Outlets is on the Rise

The Pew Research Center has released an update to its previous survey about Americans’ trust in news organizations. The survey found that Americans from both major political parties report increased levels of trust in both national and local news sources.

Overall, 62% of U.S. adults say they have a lot of or some trust in the information they get from national news organizations (that’s 6 percentage points higher than a year ago), and 75% trust local news outlets (up 5 points). 

Fifty percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents say they have at least some trust in information from national news organizations (up 6 points), while 73% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents have at least some trust (up 4 points from last year).

Most strikingly, the percentage of Americans ages 18-29 who say they trust national news organizations has risen from 51% last year to 60% now (even more than the 52% who say they trust information from social media). The number of Republicans in this age group who trust national news outlets rose 12 points, from 42% last year to 54%. For Democrats, 65% say they trust national news.

Here at Ad Fontes Media, we’ve analyzed more than 4,000 national and local news sources for their bias and reliability, and about 62% of those were rated as minimally biased and fact-based. The logos of those outlets fall within the green box of the Media Bias Chart®. We encourage everyone to consider these news outlets when looking for trustworthy sources of information.

Today we’re releasing the November edition of the Media Bias Chart® for web/print sources. (Charts with podcast and TV/video sources will be published later this month). This chart contains 108 of the 3,064 websites our team has fully rated, and 32 of those fall within the green box, including Pew Research Center, which conducted the media trust survey:

• AP | Associated Press
• Bellingcat
• Bloomberg News
• Cato Institute
• Colorado Springs Gazette
• Commonplace
• Connecticut Post
• Deseret News
• Florida’s Voice
• Forbes
• FOX 25 Oklahoma City KOKH
• Fox Business (website)
• GZERO Media
• ISW – Institute for the Study of War
• Just Security
• MinistryWatch
• Newsweek
• Oil City News
• Persuasion
• Pew Research Center
• Politico
• Revista Semana
• The Guardian
• The Hill
• The New York Times
• The Reload
• The Village Voice
• TribLive
• USAFacts
• Van Jones
• VoteHub
• Washington Post

We include as many logos as possible on each chart image in order to meet demand, but we realize that the chart can get crowded and hard to read. That’s why we publish a list of all sources on each chart. You can find a list of the 108 sources on this edition of the web chart here. 

Twelve sources are making their debut on this month’s chart.

• Commonplace
• Connecticut Post
• Fake Science News
• ISW – Institute for the Study of War
• Just Security
• Newser
• Pirate Wires
• Public Notice – Aaron Rupar
• Relentless | Kyle Becker
• The Revolutionist
• TribLive
• Van Jones

If you’re interested in our ratings for a website not on this chart, you can search for it on
our NEW Interactive Media Bias Chart®. Everyone can now access data on all 4,900 web, TV/video and podcast sources we’ve rated! On the free versions you’ll have limits on how many times you can search (five searches all time on the free version, 10 searches per month if you create a free login). You can also now filter your search results by ownership, geographic location, and source or content topic.

For additional searching, you’ll need to subscribe for as little as $5 a month. Our subscriptions come with even more perks, like viewing how a source’s bias and reliability ratings have changed over time.

You can also search all sources we’ve rated on our free mobile app for Android or Apple (daily search limits apply).

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