With the opportunity to chat far longer with a podcast host than what he’d get on television, former President Trump has made podcasts part of his media outreach strategy in 2024. He’s appeared on shows such as the All-In Podcast and Impaulsive Podcast. Vice President Kamala Harris has done the same, turning up on shows such as We Can Do Hard Things. Not only do podcasts offer the candidates more time to explain their positions, but they also reach what is a growing audience for political news.
Morning Consult has released a new survey finding that more than one in ten Democrats and Republicans say they tune to a podcast at least daily as part of their news consumption diet. That may be about a third of what broadcast television gets each day, but the data shows podcast news consumption now exceeds that of print newspapers. Morning Consult’s data also shows that Democrats are slightly more likely to be daily news podcast listeners than Republicans.
Trust in podcasts, and the media overall, remains low, however. Morning Consult says the partisan divide is clear. While 63% of Democrats say they have “a lot” or “some” confidence in the news media, just 38% of Republicans say the same. That is a 25-point gap.
As a still-emerging medium with lots of shows coming from unknown sources, many of whom have strong opinions, the public doesn’t put a lot of trust in what they hear right now. Overall, just 4% of U.S. adults said they trust what they hear on podcasts. The unexpected twist is it is Republicans that have more trust in podcasts than Democrats. Five percent of Republicans have trust in podcasts versus 3% of listeners who are Democrats.
But trust was hard to come by for any medium, young or old. A similar gap is seen for radio, where 7% of listeners have trust in the medium, versus 4% for Democrats.
The report, which includes data from Morning Consult Intelligence, finds the broadcast networks attract the most viewers, regardless of political party: Nearly three in five Democrats and Republicans say they watch ABC, CBS and NBC. There are also clear partisan divides. Democrats are 23 percentage points more likely to watch CNN, while Republicans are 23 points more likely to watch Fox News.
In terms of trust, Morning Consult says Republicans have far less confidence in the news media. It says 63% of Democrats say they have “a lot” or “some” confidence in the news media, while just 38% of Republicans say the same.
But when it comes to trust in specific media outlets, Morning Consult says “local news reigns supreme” as both the general public and Republicans gave their local news outlets the highest trust rating out of any outlet it surveyed.
The survey is based on data collected May 4-5 and July 31-Aug. 4 among representative samples of roughly 2,200 U.S. adults, with unweighted margins of error of +/-2%. Read more details and access the full report HERE.
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