Where Americans Get Their News
The information bubble is real.
Pew (“The Political Gap in Americans’ News Sources“):
For years now, Democrats have been much more likely than Republicans to say they trust the information that comes from national news organizations.
A new Pew Research Center survey gets much more specific: How do Americans feel about 30 of the country’s major news sources?
Democrats and independents who lean toward the Democratic Party are much more likely than Republicans and GOP-leaning independents to both use and trust a number of major news sources. These include the major TV networks (ABC, CBS and NBC), the cable news networks CNN and MSNBC, major public broadcasters PBS and NPR, and the legacy newspaper with the largest number of digital subscribers, The New York Times.
Republicans, meanwhile, are much more likely to distrust than trust all of these sources. A smaller number of the sources we asked about are more heavily used and trusted by Republicans than Democrats, including Fox News, The Joe Rogan Experience, Newsmax, The Daily Wire, the Tucker Carlson Network and Breitbart.
In many cases, supporters of the two main U.S. political parties are relying largely on different sources of news and information.
Republicans and independents who lean Republican get news from a fairly concentrated group of sources, and one rises to the top: Fox News. A majority of Republicans (57%) say they regularly get news from the cable network, at least double the share who say they turn to any other news source we asked about.
Behind Fox, Republicans are most likely to say they regularly get news from the three major broadcast networks – ABC News (27%), NBC News (24%) and CBS News (22%) – and The Joe Rogan Experience podcast (22%).
While not among Republicans’ most-consumed news sources, several sources are more likely to be regular sources of news for Republicans than Democrats, including Newsmax (15% vs. 1%), The Daily Wire (12% vs. 2%) and Tucker Carlson Network (9% vs. 1%).
Democrats and Democratic leaners, on the other hand, turn to a wider range of the sources we asked about. Nearly half of Democrats say they regularly get news from CNN (48%), NBC (47%) and ABC (46%). About four-in-ten Democrats say they get news from CBS (39%), while roughly three-in-ten say the same about MSNBC (33%), NPR (32%), The Associated Press (31%), PBS (31%), BBC News (30%) and The New York Times (29%).
All of these sources are far more likely to be consumed by Democrats than Republicans. To a lesser extent, Democrats also are more likely than Republicans to say they get news from The Washington Post (18% vs. 7%), Politico (12% vs. 4%) and The Atlantic (10% vs. 1%).
The general findings are hardly surprising. We’ve known for a very long time that people select news sources that confirm their biases rather than challenging them. As the parties have further sorted along educational lines, with college-educated voters moving to the Democratic Party and the working class moving to the GOP, it’s only natural that their news diets would reflect this.
Regardless of one’s views of the usefulness and trustworthiness of the various sources on the list, the degree of sorting should be worrisome. A democracy can’t function without a common understanding of how the government is performing.
I think in addition to a lack of common understanding about how government is performing, we’re also suffering from a lack of consensus on what government should do and for whom. That disconnect seems the more troubling to me and may account for a significant part of the government performing disconnect.
I’d like to see percentages for miscellaneous podcasts, local or satellite radio, Facebook and other social media, and religious outlets.
During the Guilded Age, each city had a dozen newspapers, one for each ethic and political niche. Somehow the country muddled through the discordant voices. It’s the period from WWII to the Internet age, with one newspaper per town and only 3 broadcast networks that’s unusual in its uniformity. Current state of affairs is simply a return to the historical norm
@Bubba HoTep: We really didn’t have anything resembling a modern democracy during the Gilded Age. The Senate was still selected by the state legislatures, presidential candidates were chosen by party bosses, and the federal government had very little power over everyday affairs. You really need common sources in a post-New Deal age.
@Bubba HoTep:
110% this. The so called “golden age” of professionalized, post-war journalism is a historical blip when you look at the history of the press in the US.
And I do think there is something unique about the current age in terms of the reach of partisan journalism and the level of coordination between the different partisan news sources. Additionally, AI and deep fakes are going to make that even more challenging in the years to come.
@Fortune:
I agree about podcasts and radio sources (in particular right wing radio networks). The question of social media is an interesting one–at least in terms of what we consider news/reportage. To what degree are people relying on social media to connect with aggregated news from existing sources and to what degree are facebook and twitter posts being seen as news themselves.
Oh, the professional, objective journalism was a blip. We’re returning to normal. Oh, the widespread living wage that allowed one working person to support a family of 5-6 people was a blip. We’re returning to normal. Oh, the college tuition that could be paid through part time jobs was a blip. We’re returning to normal. Oh, the respect and tolerance of minorities was a blip. We’re returning to normal.
What do you think democracy and a peaceful free society is? The historical norm?
Anyone who answers the question of “where do you primarily get your news from?” with “the Joe Rogan experience” should immediately have their internet privileges revoked. That’s like buying all your groceries from Home Depot or heating your house by cutting the outflow hose to your clothes dryer. I mean, you are clearly not capable of making rational assessments.
@Matt Bernius: You’re right, people don’t know or notice the primary sources of the information they’re receiving.
@James Joyner:
That’s a really provocative rebuttal. I need to think about that more, but I suspect you are onto something here.
So basically the “news” division confirms this from 1945:
Of course, “educated” doesn’t mean in the true definition of the word, but rather “credentialed” or a holder of the declining magic parchment.
@James Joyner:
Fox was developed specifically to confirm the biases of its target audience.
@Matt Bernius:
I find it unfortunate that anyone considers JRE a news source. A recent episode of Malcolm Gladwell’s podcast focused on Rogan. Whatever one thinks of Gladwell, he made the point that conducting a high-quality, meaningful interview is difficult.
We live in a country wherein an alarming number of people think they could successfully land a commercial airliner in an emergency. Compared to that scenario, journalism is cake. If one holds either or both belief(s), it is easy to attribute to malice errors in reporting or gaps in information.
@JKB: “So basically the “news” division confirms this from 1945:”
Surprised me there using a quote from 20 years later than your standard timely cites. But you made up for it with the 1913 edition of the dictionary.
@Kurtz:
It would be a great service if airlines, plane manufacturers, and such flight schools as have them, allowed use of their simulators for such people free and on demand.
Set them a few minutes before the start of descent, on the easiest approach on Earth, with perfect weather, zero obstacles, and all landing aids available, and I predict better than 80% would crash before reaching the runway.
I definitely would. I know this because I’ve a notion of what’s involved in such a routine landing.
Where I grew up, right-wing evangelicals made the meta-argument for creationism. They were smart enough to realize that the earth being 3000 years old is not any way true. But they tried to make it sound like believing in Genesis is exactly like believing in the results of radiocarbon dating, and that we all, evolutionists and creationists alike, are products of our own thinking, regardless of the evidence.
In a certain way, yes this is true. In another way, it’s total bullshit designed for obfuscation. You aren’t going to convince any scientist to have doubts about their reasoning regarding the half-life of an element. Fox and its bubble took this obfuscation and went nuclear. That’s why the right’s information bubble is derived from right-wing evangelical culture and its bullshit. No one can write, speak, or think clearly, because doing that would end the charade.
@Kathy:
MS’s Flight Simulator would disabuse those people of their flights of fancy without use of a hardware sim.
Of course, some percentage of them would enable every assist setting and claim victory when they landed. The majority would not be able to take off without going through a bunch of tutorials.
@Kurtz:
Is it still around?
I never got into it. despite my interest in aviation, it was way too complicated (flying isn’t easy). I made do with simpler games. One from the 90s that simulated an A-10 Warthog had realistic flight responses. That means if you reduced speed you lost altitude, and other obvious stuff like that.
Anyway, they can argue PC simulators are games (partly true), and on a real plane things would be different (also partly true). As regards physical controls (stick, switches, flight management software, etc.), instruments, displays, warning systems, and even outside visuals, a hardware simulator is 100% flying the plane without the risk.
@Kathy:
It is. They released new versions in 2020 and 2024. 1:1 scale. Real time weather.
The thing is both MSFS and X-plane are realistic to the point that one session should be enough to teach those morons a lesson in humility.
But irrational confidence is irrational. So, maybe not. Of course, those types probably need to crash a 777 before they would admit they couldn’t do it.
I suppose I have some faith that a chunk of them would take one look at the cockpit controls and recognize their mistake.
@JKB: I remember reading that Lewis quote a long time ago and not really buying it at the time. That was when I was at peak evangelical, too.
Everyone is gullible somewhere, somehow. Being more educated helps a little, but it doesn’t confer immunity. I’ve been wrong about stuff, and I am super highly educated.
The part I disagree with the strongest is that the working class is somehow less gullible. That does not match anything at all in my experience. And I’ve been around a lot of working class folks in my time, having grown up one.
@Jay L Gischer: Ultimately, CS Lewis is always about spirituality and almost never about politics, so that point factors in some way. But since JKB started his providing sound bites as self-evident schtick, I mostly just ignore them.
This, polarized news, is one of the two major drivers of our current political situation. The other is the Koch Bros et al successful campaign to remove barriers to money in politics.
@Kurtz:
I last saw it sometime in the early 90s. the graphics were poor, but the controls and instruments were all there. Even a simple small prop plane with one engine is hard to actually fly without instruction. If flying were easy, there wouldn’t be so much automation.
Of course, it may be the automation that leads idiots to believe they can land a plane. Maybe they figure you sit on the left seat and press the button labeled “LAND PLANE”. What’s so hard about that, right?
@just nutha:
The Lewis quote is only applicable to current conditions in the opposite way JKB seems to think. (In my view, it does not apply at all.)
The right-wing media ecosystem is the result of the recognition that the working class is “our problem” and in need of “reconditioning”.
It is troubling that JKB would even consider a quote that includes gullibility. Off the top of my head, consider:
Jade Helm 15 conspiracy theories
Pizzagate
Q Anon
Also, note the RW fanfare about Trump releasing JFK assassination docs. If one believes that elements of CIA were behind the assassination, those involved were RWers. Unless, of course, today’s right-wing is so far off the map that Allen Dulles was a lefty.
That illustrates one of the dangers of ideology as well as its applied version, partisanship: the erosion of critical literacy.
I don’t understand how this squares with the ratings:
Those figures are pretty typical compared to other times I’ve looked them up. 1% of the population or less, the vast majority being Boomers. That does not add up to “57% of Republicans.”
It’s the same thing with the rest of that quoted section. 48% of Democrats say they get news from CNN, but the ratings say:
I don’t see how this math works, but maybe someone with more knowledge of the industry can explain it.
@Andy:
I scanned the ugly-ass page that lists the questions asked in the survey.
I may have missed it, but the survey does not appear to distinguish between consumption via television vs. via internet.
@Kurtz:
Yeah, that seems to be the case. It turns out most of that data is proprietary, not often released, and could be subject to gaming since it’s often not from a neutral party.
For example, I found this Fox press release that claims 130 million unique visitors in the month of April. That would certainly explain the gap.
@Andy: Oh hey nice to see you in here.
Did you read this post before or after you claimed in a different thread that people get their news from a wide range of sources? Because this clearly contradicts that claim of yours 😛