During his tenure as President at the beginning of the twentieth century, Theodore Roosevelt became known for “trust-busting.” That was because of the actions he took to break up monopolies and large corporations which he felt were doing harm to the American people.
In this twenty first century, trust-busting has taken on a new meaning. It is a description of the American people’s loss of faith and confidence in the news media.
The question becomes what has caused this trust-busting. We address that question in this first blog of a two-part series by looking at: the general state of trust in the news media today; trust across news sources; and trust by political and demographic groups.
Surveys done by Gallup, the Pew Research Center (Pew), and YouGov disclosed that trust in the news media today is in a very troubled state:
- The annual Gallup poll conducted in September 2024 found that only 31% of the respondents had a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in the mass media (such as newspapers, TV and radio) to report the news fully, accurately and fairly.
- The Pew Research Center survey conducted in March 2025 found that 67% of those contacted had “a lot of” or “some” confidence in the information that comes from national news organizations.
- The YouGov survey conducted in May 2025 found that 32% of those surveyed thought the “news in general” was “very trustworthy” or “trustworthy.”
As this data shows, the Gallup and YouGov findings were similar with findings of a trust level of about one-third. The Pew Research Center is much higher with an aggregate of 67% due to the fact that it included 50% of respondents who had only “some” trust in the news.
Each of the surveys show interesting trends in terms of trust in the news media and the nature of trust today:
- Megan Brenan begins her piece on Gallup’s most recent findings noting, “Americans continue to register record-low trust in the mass media…” She highlights that in Gallup polls trust ranged from 68% to 72% in the 1970’s, and fell to 51% to 55% by the late 1990’s to 2000’s. And, “The news media is the least trusted group among 10 U.S. civic and political institutions involved in the democratic process.”
- Pew has been doing its research on trust since 2016. During that period trust in the national news organizations has fallen from 76% to 67%. In their commentary on the most recent findings, Elisa Shearer and Kirsten Eddy note “Americans are now more likely to say they trust information from news organizations and social media sites than they were last year…” They explain this is “largely driven by an increase in trust among Republicans,” coinciding with Donald Trump’s return to the presidency.
- YouGov has been doing its trust research since 2021. In their analysis of the most recent survey results, Taylor Orth and Carl Bialik observe, “Average net trust in news outlets increased slightly this year — to +8 from +4 in 2024 — after a move in the opposite direction last year from 2023. Overall, trust in outlets included in each of the last four years has changed little…”
To sum it up, no matter where one looks trust in the news media overall has been fading for some time. Even though there may be slight rebounds, they do not appear to be primarily driven by actions of the news media itself. (More on this later.)
Trust Across News Organizations
Gallup, Pew, and YouGov provide a range of insights into the nature of trust in a variety of news organizations.
Gallup focuses on trust in the traditional new media of newspapers and TV. Megan Brennan and Lydia Saad of Gallup write, “…in 2024, as in recent years, news media institutions-–specifically, newspaper and television news — ranked at the bottom just above Congress.” Brennan and Saad report that in terms of honesty and ethics, the “very high/high” ratings given by participants were: 13% for television reporters, 17% for newspaper reporters, 19% for journalists.
Pew drills down a little deeper in its analysis, looking at trust in information from: national news organizations; local news organizations; friends, family, and acquaintances; and social media sites such as Facebook, X, and YouTube. In order, the combined ratings of “a lot” and “some” for those groups were: 80% local news, 67% national news, 63% friends, family, and acquaintances, 42% social media.
YouGov provides an expansive view, assessing trust in 52 specific news sources (outlets). YouGov calculates a net trust score which is “how much more likely Americans are to say the outlet’s news is trustworthy or very trustworthy than untrustworthy or very untrustworthy.”
Using this calculation:
- The most trusted sources are: The Weather Channel (+49), the BBC (+26) and PBS (+25).
- The least trusted sources are: the National Enquirer (-39), Infowars (-15), and Breitbart News (-7)
- Many of the traditional sources such as: Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, the Associated Press, NBC, CBS, Time Magazine, and The New York Times had positive ratings between (+24) to (+14).
Political and Demographic Groups’ Impact on Trust
All of the polls found that political and demographic membership had a significant impact on trust in news sources.
Political Group Differences
The Gallup commentators point out that, “Whereas about a third of U.S. adults say they have no trust at all in the mass media, 59% of Republicans hold this view — a view that saw a particularly sharp increase between 2015 and 2017, when it rose 21 percentage points to 48%. By contrast, “Lack of trust is also up sharply among independents, now 42%, while it continues to be low — 6% this year — among Democrats.”
Pew found that Trump’s victory increased Republicans overall trust in the news. The Pew commentators state, “Around half of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents (53%) now say they have at least some trust in the information they get from national news organizations — a 13 percentage point increase from September 2024, when 40% of Republicans said the same.”
YouGov commentators drilled down into the political differences in trust by news source. Among the key differences they highlight are the following:
- For 44 of the 52 outlets asked about (85%), a greater share of Democrats trust than distrust them. That’s true for only 21 outlets among Republicans (40%).
- Democrats have the most trust in PBS, BBC, and NBC, while Republicans particularly trust Fox News, Fox Business Channel, and Newsmax.
- CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News are the most politically polarizing outlets. Net trust in CNN is 80 points higher among Democrats than among Republicans, and net trust in MSNBC is 77 points higher. Net trust in Fox News is 76 points higher among Republicans than among Democrats.
Demographic Group Differences
The Gallup survey disclosed that over the past two decades, gaps in trust emerged by age. An analysis by age groups shows a 17-percentage-point gap in trust between the oldest Americans (those aged 65 and older) and those under age 50–43% vs. 26%, respectively. In 2001–2003, this gap was less than 10%.
The Gallup commentators note this gap has increased by party as well, stating: “Young Democrats trust the media far less than older Democrats do: 31% of Democrats aged 18 to 29 versus 74% of those aged 65 and older have a great deal or fair amount of confidence.”
Pew’s findings regarding age group differences reinforce and add to those of Gallup. Its 2024 research showed that: the trust of national news organizations by age was: 65 and older (74%) versus (56%) for those under 30. This gap was even wider for trust in the social media. 54% of young adults under 30 had “at least some trust” in social media versus 28% of those ages 65 and older.
As with the political differences, YouGov breaks the responses down by age group with even more specificity. Here’s some of what its commentators said:
- Americans are divided by age far more for their trust in news from social media than for their trust in other sources of news. Adults under 45 are more trusting of news on social media platforms than older adults are — especially news from TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, WhatsApp, and X.
- Adults under 45 are most likely to have used social media for news, while older adults are most likely to have relied on television.
- Adults under 45 are somewhat more likely than older Americans to say they’ve gotten news from the New York Times, CNN, USA Today, and Forbes, and less likely to have gotten it from ABC, NBC, CBS, and The Associated Press.
The Drivers of Trust-Busting
As the foregoing data demonstrates, there are a number of factors contributing to trust-busting and the news media.
They include: the perspective of the traditional news media; the emergence of the alternative news media; the growth of social media and disinformation and misinformation; the mindsets of the news consumers, the impact of news influencers, and, the impact of the MAGA media disruptor.
Volumes have and will be written on each of these factors. We will present our top-line thoughts on them and what to do to confront the trust-busting in our second blog which will be posted on July 9th.
In closing, we leave you with these lines from two of the best news journalists of all time, Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow, which are quite appropriate given the current state of the news in our country.”
- Cronkite ended his nightly news show by saying, “And, that’s the way it is.”
- Murrow famously said, “Good night and good luck.