Jaded by Journalists: Americans Lose Faith in the Media

originally posted: https://washingtonstand.com

Author: Marjorie Jackson August 17, 2022

A recent Gallup poll confirmed what many Americans already knew — people don’t trust the media like they did before. Back in 1979, confidence in the media was at a high of 51%. Today, while Democrats tend to trust newspaper and TV media sources more than Independents and Republicans do, the poll numbers indicate that distrust is staggeringly low across the political aisle. With public faith in a variety of institutions on the decline, the media comes in at the bottom of the list, second only to the U.S. Congress.

Why are Americans jaded with journalism? Many don’t believe that fair and unbiased news reporting exists. Data shows a partisan divide in the amount of trust (and distrust) that people tend to place in mainstream media and in reporters. In recent years, even U.S. presidents have fueled and expressed distrust in the institution of media. Former President Donald Trump was frequently at odds with the “fake news media,” calling many mainstream outlets the “enemy of the people.” On air in June, President Joe Biden told Jimmy Kimmel that the “press has changed” and “everything gets sensationalized by the media.”

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