February 6, 2013

Public Policy Polling | Gallup | Pew
The polling organization that accurately predicted the 2012 presidential election — state by state — has completed its fourth annual poll of TV news trust.

Public Policy Polling found that only PBS is trusted more than it is mistrusted. Every other network is mistrusted by more people than trust it.

“Fox News has hit a record low in the four years that we’ve been doing this poll,” PPP reports; “41% of voters trust it to 46% who do not. To put those numbers into some perspective the first time we did this poll, in 2010, 49% of voters trusted it to 37% who did not.”

Do you trust…? % trust it % don’t trust it % unsure
PBS 52 29 19
Fox News 41 46 13
NBC News 39 42 19
CNN 38 43 20
MSNBC 35 44 21
CBS News 34 43 23
ABC 32 42 26
Comedy Central 26 46 28
Source: PPP telephone interviews of 800 voters from Jan. 31 to Feb. 3, 2013

When asked directly, “Which TV news outlet do you trust the most?,” respondents chose Fox News as the most trusted, followed by PBS, CNN and ABC. The least trusted were Fox News, MSNBC, CNN and Comedy Central.

The poll split across party lines: “Democrats trust everything except Fox, and Republicans don’t trust anything other than Fox,” PPP found.

A Gallup poll of about 1,000 adults conducted last September showed that 60 percent of Americans distrust the media — a new high (or low, depending on your perspective) that was driven by independents and Republicans.

A Pew survey last July found that among the broadcast networks, ABC, CNN and CBS were the most trusted; Fox News and MSNBC were the least trusted.

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Julie Moos (jmoos@poynter.org) has been Director of Poynter Online and Poynter Publications since 2009. Previously, she was Editor of Poynter Online (2007-2009) and Poynter Publications…
Julie Moos

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