This is an opinion piece. It reflects the author’s own views, not reported fact.
Two new Pew Research Center releases show Americans trusting news organizations more than they did a year ago, and backing the press as a check on power in larger numbers. Daily Drolls argues that this is good news only if the industry treats it as a debt.
What the new Pew numbers show
According to the Pew Research Center, a survey of 5,193 U.S. adults conducted September 14 to 20, 2026, found that 62% have at least some trust in information from national news organizations. That is up 6 points from 56% in September 2025. Trust in local news organizations stands at 75%, up 5 points from 70%.
A second Pew survey, of 5,166 adults conducted August 24 to 30, 2026, found that 80% say criticism from news organizations keeps political leaders from doing things they shouldn’t. That compares with 75% in September 2025. Only 16% say such criticism keeps leaders from doing their job.
| Measure (Pew, 2026) | Share | 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| Trust in national news | 62% | 56% |
| Trust in local news | 75% | 70% |
| Trust in social media sites | 38% | 37% |
| Press criticism keeps leaders in check | 80% | 75% |
Is this a recovery or just a reprieve?
The honest answer is that it is a partial recovery. Pew notes that trust in national outlets is still below the 76% it recorded in February 2016. The gap is 14 points (76 minus 62). Readers who see headlines about rising trust should keep that larger picture in view.
A single year of improvement also proves little. Trust measured through a survey can move with the news cycle, with who holds power and with how a respondent feels about the country that month. Daily Drolls reads the rebound as an opening, not a settled trend.
Why local news keeps its lead
Local outlets sit 13 points above national ones (75% against 62%). Pew’s data show the advantage across party lines: 81% of Democrats and 69% of Republicans trust local news at least somewhat, up from 78% and 64% a year earlier.
The explanation is partly a matter of opinion, but it is a plausible one. Local reporters cover school boards, zoning hearings and county budgets, where readers can check the story against their own street. National coverage asks for trust at a distance. The lesson for newsrooms of every size is that proximity and verifiability earn credibility.
The partisan gap is the real warning
The rise is broad, but the divide remains. Pew finds 73% of Democrats and 50% of Republicans trust national news, a 23-point gap. Republicans are up from 44%, which is encouraging, yet half still trust national outlets little or not at all.
Age matters too. Pew reports 60% of adults ages 18 to 29 trust national outlets, against 70% of those 65 and older. Among Democrats, 65% of the youngest group and 86% of the oldest do so. A news industry that is trusted mainly by older readers has a succession problem.
Does a press that criticizes need to be trusted at all?
There is a strong counter-argument. Pew’s other finding suggests the watchdog role may matter more than approval. If 80% say press criticism keeps leaders in check, perhaps trust in any given outlet is secondary. A skeptical public, one could say, is a healthy public, and a press loved by everyone would be suspect.
That has real force. Blind trust is no virtue, and readers should keep checking claims. But a watchdog that nobody believes cannot restrain anyone. Criticism changes behavior only when audiences find it credible enough to act on, whether by voting, subscribing or complaining. Skepticism and trust are not opposites. The healthiest posture is conditional trust that is withdrawn when an outlet fails.
Pew’s own data hint at this. Support for the watchdog role among Republicans is 73%, up from 67% in September 2024 under a Democratic president, according to Pew. That runs against the usual pattern in which each party warms to press scrutiny when the other holds the White House. It suggests the principle is wider than any one partisan moment.
Where social media still stands
Trust in social media sites is 38%, essentially unchanged from 37%. That is 24 points below national news (62 minus 38). Whatever the rebound means, it has not moved audiences toward feeds.
That matters because news influencers draw regular attention from a large share of younger adults, and recommendation feeds reward engagement over accuracy. A trust rebound in newsrooms will not hold if audiences keep drifting elsewhere. The same logic applies to automated answers: use of AI chatbots is already outpacing trust in them.
Three ways to keep the rebound
Daily Drolls proposes a short test for any outlet, including this one:
- Show the evidence. Name the document, dataset or person behind a claim, and say what is not known.
- Correct visibly. Fix errors prominently and promptly, not quietly.
- Stay close to the reader. Cover things audiences can verify for themselves, as local reporting does.
None of these is new. They are simply the habits that a 62% trust level has to be built on, and the ones that a public willing to back press scrutiny at 80% is entitled to expect.
Trust is a loan, not a gift
The rise in trust is welcome, and so is the public’s stated support for a press that holds leaders to account. But a 14-point shortfall against 2016, a 23-point partisan gap and a weaker hold on younger readers say the loan is not yet repaid. Newsrooms should spend this goodwill on rigor, not on self-congratulation, and readers should keep asking the same question of every source: how do you know?
This is general commentary, not professional advice.
Sources: Pew Research Center
