48% of Americans do not trust any media sources to deliver them unbiased news, according to a new poll.
That number is up ten percentage points from the end of 2020, according to Civic Science. Civic Science polled 331,665 Americans between Jan. 1 and March 31.
Nearly 60% of adults claim to be “very concerned” by misinformation in U.S. news media. Conservatives are significantly more likely than liberals and moderates to be very concerned by misinformation in U.S. news media: https://t.co/5d3lkr0IQF pic.twitter.com/8VRFnWHN1y
— CivicScience (@CivicScience) April 8, 2021
Conservatives are more likely than liberals to be concerned about media bias and misinformation, according to the poll. 82% of conservatives describe themselves as very concerned about misinformation, compared to only 49% of liberals. Younger people are also less likely than older people to have a trusted news source. (RELATED: Poll Finds That More Than One-Third Of Americans Don’t Trust The Media)
Those findings echo a poll conducted in January by Edelman’s trust barometer, which found that only 46% of Americans trust traditional news media. That same poll found that 56% of Americans believe “journalists and reporters are purposely trying to mislead people by saying things they know are false or gross exaggerations.”
The poll’s release comes on the heels of a “60 Minutes” segment claiming that Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis awarded COVID-19 vaccination deals to the popular supermarket Publix due to the chain’s donation to his election campaign. In reality, local government and public health officials requested that Publix distribute vaccines due to its convenient locations. Democratic West Palm Beach Mayor Dave Kerner and Democratic Emergency Management Director Jared Moskowitz both released statements explaining that they offered their sides of the story to “60 Minutes,” but that the program was not interested in hearing their perspectives.