Within the last century, news media has gone from being one of the most highly protected jobs in the United States to one of the most heavily targeted. As mistrust in the media grows and younger generations turn to un-vetted podcasters and social media moguls for their information, we must try to restore the positive relationship Americans once had with honest, traditional journalism before it is replaced with blind loyalism to party.  

A recent Gallup Poll reports that trust in the news in America is at an all-time low, with only 31% of respondents trusting the media a great deal or a fair amount. 36% of respondents said they do not trust the mass media at all. Only 26% of respondents aged 18-29 reported having a great deal or fair amount of trust in mass news media, such as TV, radio and newspapers.  

This is the lowest trust in media has been since 2016, which was the lowest in history to that point. There is also an enormous partisan difference in media trust, with 54% of Democrats and only 12% of Republicans having a great deal or fair amount of trust in the mass media.  

Given the current political climate, the staunch decrease in media trust in the last few years is no coincidence. Some of the formerly most trusted media organizations in the nation—The Washington Post, The New York Times, CNN, CBS, etc.—have been attacked as “fake news organizations.” High-level politicians have gotten into the habit of dissing journalism they don’t like.  

These attacks are not caused by a lack of honesty or a failure of journalists to serve their watchdog function. On the contrary, the media is being villainized for serving as independent oversight of the government. Politicians in the United States have started to liken themselves to other elected leaders of the world who have edged towards authoritarianism with their media rhetoric.  

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has weaponized his political stature against the news media, changing tax codes and licensing rules against skeptical media and finding subtle ways to fund loyalist media organizations with tax breaks and advertising revenue. In effect, any media that published content skeptical of Orban was forced into closure. Orban changed the face of the “free press” without explicitly destroying it.  

The same is possible in the United States. In 2023, former Defense Chief of Staff Kash Patel threatened to target “corrupt” “lamestream” news organizations “criminally or civilly.”  

My goal as a journalist has always been to find the truth and present it in a compelling way, educate the free world and hold the people in charge accountable. I stand behind the sometimes poorly executed principles of freedom of speech in this country, one of which is the right of the press to serve the public as watchdogs. 

I feel my dream slipping away one day at a time. With the consolidation of media for financial gain, I am worried independent journalism will one day cease to exist altogether. I couldn’t believe what this country’s journalism was becoming when Amazon bought The Washington Post.  

I worry that TikTok “citizen journalists” and popular podcasters like Joe Rogan and Andrew Tate are making people more comfortable with twisted information. In a centrist newspaper organization, there are editors and fact-checkers all the way up the chain of command before publishing. On TikTok and podcasts, you get one guy who thinks he knows everything “educating” the youth of America with a one-sided reality.  

I am terrified that within the foreseeable future, an organization as fact focused as The Associated Press will be quietly eradicated for reporting facts those in power would rather the public not hear. Threatening the press is not only unconstitutional but unfair to the American people because it removes access to varying professional opinions.  

It is just as much my right as a journalist to critique a leader on a page as it is a podcaster’s right to voice their polarized agenda on a screen. The only reason my future career is under threat, and not some partisan podcaster’s, is because powerful people don’t like journalistic commitment to reporting facts as they are.  

Skepticism and criticism of people in power is a part of what has developed this country over its lifetime—look how the Muckrakers shaped the Industrial Revolution. Be wary of which content politicians praise and which they try to threaten. Freedom of the press is imperative.  

Photo courtesy of Depositphotos.