The Gallup polling firm reported Thursday that Americans’ trust in the media to report the news with fairness, accuracy and fullness has dropped to its lowest level since the 2016 presidential race between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.
A telephone survey of 1,005 adults, conducted Sept. 1-17 in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, found that 36% of Americans who register “a great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in the mass media represented a 4-percentage-point drop from a year ago when Mr. Trump was still in the Oval Office.
Since then, Democrats and independents experienced a 5-percentage-point drop in trust, while Republicans stayed at the same level.
The poll found that 68% of Democrats, 31% of independents and 11% of Republicans trust the media.
“Confidence in the media among Republicans over the past five years is at unprecedented lows. After a brief recovery in trust among Democrats and independents early in the Trump administration, their trust has fallen off a little in recent years. Democratic trust remains well above where it was before Trump came into office and made attacks on the media a core message of his presidency,” said Gallup’s analysis of the poll.
In a breakdown of the 36% of respondents, 7% said they have “a great deal” and 29% “a fair amount” of trust and confidence in newspapers, television and radio news reporting.
Additionally, 29% of respondents had “not very much” trust, and 34% had “none at all.”
The margin of sampling error for the poll was plus or minus 4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.
• Sean Salai can be reached at ssalai@washingtontimes.com.
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