Americans’ trust in media and Congress at record low, survey reveals
A Gallup poll published last week found that American voters’ trust in media and Congress is at an all-time low.
Trust in media
Thirty-six percent of American adults say they have no trust at all in the media, according to the survey, while 33% express having “not very much” confidence. Just 31% of respondents said they have “a great deal” or “fair amount” of confidence in the media, a tiny drop from 32% last year.
Split by party lines, 54% of Democrats trust the media to report the news fairly, accurately, and fully, compared to 12% of Republicans and 27% of Independents. Democrats, while historically trustful of the media, are nearing their record low in media confidence from 2016 which stood at 51%.
Overall, trust in media has declined sharply over the last fifty years. In 1972, only 6% of Americans said they had no trust or confidence in the media at all, while 68% said they had a “great deal” or “fair amount.” Today, as mentioned, those numbers are 36% and 32%, respectively.
Trust in Congress
The same poll found that the United States Congress is almost as poorly trusted as the media. Just 34% of Americans report having trust in the Senate and House of Representatives. The number rose to 37% when respondents were asked how much they trust the federal government to handle domestic affairs.
Trust in government
The Gallup poll appears to be in line with other surveys showing that most Americans have an unfavorable view of the government.
A Gallup poll last year found that 21% of American voters see the government as the biggest problem facing the country, up from 15% in late 2022. The number consisted of 24% of Republicans and 18% of Democrats.
According to a New York Times/Siena poll in October 2022, most Americans believe the government serves those in power. Of the 792 registered voters surveyed, 68% said “the government mainly works to benefit powerful elites,” while just 22% said it “mainly works to benefit ordinary people.”
In the same poll, 70% of Americans said democracy is facing a threat that could best be summarized by “the government,” “government corruption,” or “non-specific politicians/leaders.”
Most Americans (66%) said the federal government is a threat to democracy, evenly split between those who said it is a “major threat” and those who said it is a “minor threat.”
Another national survey found that nearly 8 in 10 Americans believe the United States has a two-tiered justice system, with politicians and members of the D.C. elite treated differently than ordinary Americans.
A Harvard-Harris survey of 2,004 voters last year found that 70% of Americans are either very concerned or somewhat concerned about election interference by the FBI and intelligence agencies in a future presidential election.
Seventy-one percent of voters, including 65% of Democrats and 76% of Republicans, also said they want wide-ranging reforms to protect elections against interference by law enforcement and the intelligence community.
In 2022, a University of Chicago poll found that 73% of Republicans and 51% of Democrats feel the government is “corrupt and rigged against everyday people like me." The poll of 1,000 Americans found that 28% of voters, 37% of whom have guns in their homes, feel “it may be necessary at some point soon for citizens to take up arms against the government.”
