Willie A. Lora, Senior Fellow, MSI² for FinGurú
The main mission of journalism is to inform the public, hold those in power accountable, and promote informed decision-making. This involves seeking the truth, acting for the public good, and upholding ethical standards. Journalists serve as watchdogs, reporting on issues relevant to their communities and contributing to the proper functioning of a democratic society.
The strength or weakness of democracies worldwide has been accompanied by a power not elected but entrusted by citizens, as a vital instrument of information so that people can make decisions that directly affect their daily lives and communities. This watchdog instrument, which journalism and the media have represented, is now plagued by misinformation, defamation lawsuits, a significant lack of credibility, and largely politicized.
The most famous and revered news anchor in U.S. history, Walter Cronkite, once said: "As the anchor of CBS Evening News, I have closed the broadcast for almost 20 years by saying something very simple. And that's the way it is. For me, that describes the highest ideal of a journalist: to report the facts as they are, regardless of the consequences or controversies arising from those facts."
But how much has journalism changed since that famous phrase by Walter Cronkite? Quite a bit. A recent Gallup poll shows that trust in the media and journalism is at one of its lowest points in history, at 31%, compared to 76% in the 1970s. This study also reflects a significant credibility gap in the media between the two major political currents in the country, the conservative and the liberal. Some 54% of liberals (Democrats) trust traditional media compared to 12% of conservatives (Republicans), clearly showing a significant political bias in the way information is consumed based on what is presented to their audience.
We could point to two key moments in the industry's trajectory that could give us a clue as to how trust in the media began to deteriorate. While traditional large media conglomerates—such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and FOX Corp.—are mostly headquartered in cities with a strong liberal orientation like New York, Washington D.C., Los Angeles, and Atlanta, the growing political polarization has led many of their reports to shift from everyday issues to a more intense, divisive, and strongly biased informational agenda.
One of those moments of significant change in the industry was when they became publicly traded companies, which caused the focus to shift from reporting the most important and relevant stories for the country and its communities to how to maintain the stock value of the companies. This shift placed a lot of pressure on their leaders to not only seek ways to maximize their profits and thus maintain and increase the value of their stocks above their journalistic responsibilities and their duty to inform ethically and objectively the public.
This forced the industry to get closer to political parties and companies linked to politics in order to make business deals and thus increase profits, something that was previously seen as an unethical practice. A clear example of this is that during the last two to three presidential cycles, coverage of political events has been as polarized as the country itself. From the industry's perspective, the model became: the more political coverage provided, the more sales opportunities there would be.
According to an analysis by Reuters, total spending on political advertising in 2024 exceeded $10 billion, marking a historic record. Some sources estimate that the total could reach $12.3 billion, representing a 24% increase from the 2020 electoral cycle. Since the cycle began in January 2023, Democrats have outspent Republicans on advertising: $5 billion to $4.1 billion.
These numbers reflect an important reason why traditional media has turned into vehicles for partisan and political messages, far beyond the original mandate of journalistic work that Cronkite and many other original journalists interpreted as journalistic responsibility.
The other significant moment that changed the role of the media was the announcement on June 16, 2015, by businessman Donald J. Trump to seek the Republican Party nomination for the presidency of the United States. This reality was solidified during the 2016 elections, where he became the 45th president of the United States in an election that surprised the country because the vast majority of the media stated that based on "their polls," former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee, would easily win the presidential election. The New York Times published the day before the election that Secretary Clinton would win the election with an 85% chance, which turned out to be untrue.
The Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, declassified a report on the "deception" by the Obama administration regarding Russia, revealing "overwhelming evidence" showing how, after Trump won the 2016 elections against Hillary Clinton, then-President Barack Obama and his national security team laid the groundwork for what would become years of investigation into the collusion between Trump and Russia. The director explained in an interview with American network Fox News that, “first of all, they don't want [Media] the American people to know the truth. But they also recognize the complicity of the mainstream media in this, as they received preliminary lines of this false intelligence assessment fabricated by President Obama, which John Brennan and James Clapper created without any verification, lacking journalistic integrity in analyzing what they were given. They received it and published it almost immediately.”
Today, the media still refuse to cover this story to give more prominence to the case of child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, attempting to change the narrative of the most significant political scandal in a generation when they were absent in the Epstein case during the past administration.
In these 9 years since President Trump's first election, significant journalistic stories that have been ignored and in many cases ridiculed by these liberal-leaning media, which Director Gabbard blames for complicity, have turned out to be true, such as: two impeachment trials, one of which had a false report known as the “Steele Dossier,” now discredited, the infamous laptop of former President Biden's son, Hunter Biden. In the latter case, the media served as a sounding board for intelligence services by repeating a false pronouncement that the laptop story was a Russian propaganda operation, and even signed a letter 51 ex-intelligence agents, including 3 former CIA directors, stating what they knew was false, as the FBI had possession of that laptop nearly a year before that letter was published. In addition to the story of COVID-19 and the censorship applied to individuals and institutions that deviated from the official versions.
Within the battle for control of media narratives, radio has not ceased to be one of these tools, in which political interests have also aimed their cannons. The latest victim has been one of the most iconic radios in southern Florida, the famous Radio Mambí, which announced the firing of its entire workforce and the imminent closure of its operations. Latino Media Network (LMN), backed by a fund linked to George Soros, acquired 18 radio stations in 10 key markets, including Miami, Florida.
Among the stations are Radio Mambí (WQBA and WAQI), two well-known Spanish-language AM stations that have historically served the Cuban-American exiled community in southern Florida, with a frequently conservative editorial line. LMN is led by Stephanie Valencia, former director of Latino outreach for former President Barack Obama, and Democratic activist Jess Morales Rocketto, who signed an agreement to purchase these stations for $60 million.
Political polarization has also paved the way for a range of programs and podcasts that live outside traditional media, allowing society to consume content in different ways that align with their political ideologies. This is reflected in the collapse of ratings in traditional media, what we know as “Cable News,” where audiences have decreased in some cases, as with CNN, by up to 42% from July 2024 to the same date in 2025.
The financial cost to traditional media from lawsuits for misinformation, defamation, and manipulation of information has also impacted its credibility and business model.
Paramount Global, owner of CBS and its program “60 Minutes,” reached an agreement with President Trump to pay him $16 million for manipulating the interview with Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris. The program edited a response to the candidate's question, completely changing it to make it sound coherent when the response was different. Also, ABC and its program “This Week,” chaired by the former communications director for Bill Clinton in the White House, paid the Trump library fund a sum of $15 million for saying that President Trump had raped Jean Carroll, which was not true.
I believe Walter Cronkite must be asking: How far have we come? Why have we strayed so far from our responsibilities? Why have our political biases taken priority over our social responsibility? Why have we abandoned common sense? Why have we allowed hatred of one person to lead us to commit irreparable damage to the industry?
Many questions are being asked by both Cronkite and many of our readers. But the most valuable question is, why have we stopped using critical thinking, regardless of who is in charge of a public trust department? I believe that if this had been practiced at all levels with the aim of serving the common good, the industry would not be in its current state, and we would not be questioning whether this damage will be reversible. My hope is that this can be achieved in this generation, but my optimism fades more each day as I see that, despite these realities, there are no signs that this will change, at least in the coming years.
Sources: AOL, AP News (Associated Press), Axios, BrainyQuote, Brennan Center, CiberCuba, Cord Cutters News, Gallup, Reuters, The New York Times, WLRN.
Willie Lora is a recognized expert in crisis communication, news research, and top-tier special event management. He is president of Lora Media Consulting LLC, an audiovisual communication firm specializing in the development of multimedia platforms, content programming, and technology production for national and international markets. Mr. Lora has led significant media initiatives throughout his career, from overseeing the International Press Center in Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia during Pope Francis' visit to the United States to advising on U.S. presidential campaigns and multiple presidential candidacies in Latin America. He is also affiliated with the International Presidential Debate Association, where he has produced debates for television and radio. He has collaborated with Feature Story News (FSN) to expand Latino markets through the introduction of innovative IP technologies and the production of informative content.
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