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Abstract

This doctoral dissertation explores the nature of conservative and progressive distrust of the mainstream news media in the United States as it investigates its origins, drivers, and likely consequences. The project probes the emergence and development of alternative media outlets and the underpinning criticism of the established news sources on both sides of the political and ideological spectrum and provides new understanding of media distrust’s distinct foundations and focal points. This is further scrutinized and tested in two original case studies that comparatively analyzed and qualitatively contextualized coverage of climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic in selected conservative and progressive alternative news outlets. In light of its findings, the project also offers a timely critical reflection on several of the most often discussed media distrust-reducing measures. This study makes an important contribution to the fields of political science and media studies, as it exposes the asymmetries that define distrust of the mainstream news media among conservative and progressive Americans and accentuates the need to move beyond the unified theories of media distrust in the US.