Despite narratives about polarization, Americans generally share similar trust in tech media, regardless of politics
For decades, we’ve heard about how America is divided. It’s breathlessly reported by the media, and this narrative has accelerated to warp speed since Donald Trump first won the White House
Of course, this is rooted in factual, essential truth. But that does not mean, without nuance, it can’t be destructive—especially for communications pros.
America, the Polarized
I chat with many foreign and domestic tech founders considering how to employ PR to build their brands in the US. All understand that the US is a collection of distinct regions and cultures. That it is, in other words, a complicated, disparate place. All know they have to devise PR strategies that account for regional realities, because Jane in Jacksonville, is different from Ned in New York City, is different from Lola in LA.
Sensible as hell.
Which makes data-backed strategy, regional insights and specific knowledge of a company’s target customers (wherever they are) critical to US-market entry, expansion and any PR strategy that supports these things.
However, as much as we hear about a divided America living on different planets in terms of media preferences and trusted outlets, there’s more to the story.
We have numbers to suggest that, as pertains to consumer tech purchase decisions, Americans are fairly monolithic in terms of the media outlets they respect and value.
The data
In Q1 2025, we asked a nationally-representative group of 1001 adults:
“Do you trust any of the following sources for information about consumer tech products?”
We listed 10 options and told people to check all that applied.
We then cut the data by political affiliation – Democrat, Republican and Independent.
Against the backdrop of the omnipresent “America is divided” narrative, the results—which you can see in the table below—are striking.
For clarity, the “All Political Affiliations” group includes all survey respondents—effectively an average of all responses.
Here is how it looks when we juxtapose the aggregate average with individual party affiliation:
Democrats
Republicans
Independents
What are we seeing and what does it say?
The data shows three clear takeaways:
- When it comes to trust in consumer tech media, America is not divided. Republicans, Democrats, and Independents generally place similar trust in most major outlets.
- What variance there is could be called expected. Both the NYT and WIRED – outlets sometimes thought of as aligned with coastal elites – were 10+ more points trusted by Democrats than Republicans. Equally unsurprising is the fact that Republicans tend to trust the Murdoch-owned WSJ 7+ points more than Dems do.
- Across party lines, very few respondents said they trusted none of the listed options. This speaks to the resilience of legacy media in consumer tech purchasing decisions.
Taken together, this is liberating for tech PR pros and C-suiters thinking about market entry or expansion. It suggests you don’t need a partisan playbook, just credible product coverage in the handful of outlets that everyone, regardless of their politics, still trusts.
Consumer tech, our data suggest, is one of the few domains where the culture war hasn’t burned the middle ground. It appears that when people are spending money, they want reliability, not ideology.
Yes, America is a divided country, but data and nuance should guide strategy.