Exclusive | Apple News, Google promote outlets that endorse Dem presidential candidates — while shutting out Republicans: study
The most-promoted news outlets on Apple News and Google News haven’t endorsed a Republican in the last 10 presidential elections — the latest sign of alleged anti-conservative bias by the popular news aggregators, according to a new analysis.
Media Research Center, a conservative watchdog group that tracks media bias, found that newspapers and magazines featured most prominently on the Apple News and Google News feeds have exclusively endorsed Democratic presidential candidates since 1988 — while Republicans received zero endorsements.
Apple News’ five most-featured outlets — the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Guardian, the Los Angeles Times and USA Today — endorsed Democrats a combined 28 times since 1988.
The Times editorial board endorsed Democrats in every single election dating back to Michael Dukakis in 1988 — a total of 10 times. WaPo has endorsed Democratic candidates on eight occasions; the Guardian, five times; the LA Times, four times; and USA Today once.
Google News’ five most-featured outlets — the New York Times, the Guardian, the Washington Post, USA Today and the Atlantic — endorsed Democrats a combined 27 times. The Atlantic did it three times dating back to 2016.
All told, the most prominent outlets on Apple News and Google News had a 31-0 endorsement record in favor of Democrats.
“Big Tech executives insist their news platforms serve as objective public squares, but our findings lay bare the massive corporate tilt driving these algorithms,” MRC President David Bozell said in a statement. “Apple and Google systematically funnel tens of millions of users into media sources that have backed Democrats for president 31 times without a single Republican endorsement in 40 years.
“Silicon Valley has engineered these news feeds to quietly tilt public debate, insulating voters from conservative reporting while treating partisan, left-wing outlets as the nation’s default news authority.”
Microsoft’s MSN, another prominent news aggregator, is only slightly more balanced. Its five most-featured outlets — the Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times, Rolling Stone and USA Today — have issued 25 endorsements for Democratic presidential contenders compared to just two for Republicans since 1988.
The Chronicle was responsible for both GOP endorsements, backing George H.W. Bush for the Oval Office in 1988 and 1992.
Google declined to comment. The company has repeatedly said it “refutes the methodology” of MRC’s studies.
Representatives for Apple and Microsoft did not respond to requests for comment.
To conduct the analysis, MRC’s researchers reviewed the top 20 stories promoted by Google News at a set time each morning from Nov. 1, 2025, through Jan. 12, 2026. For Apple News, researchers looked at the top 20 stories from Nov. 3, 2025, through July 31, 2026. For Microsoft’s MSN, researchers reviewed from Jan. 13, 2026, through July 31.
MRC identified which of the news outlets that appeared most frequently at the top of each company’s news feed have editorial boards that endorsed presidential candidates, while outlets that did not endorse candidates were excluded.
The group used open-source research to compile presidential endorsements for each of the 10 presidential elections between 1988 and 2024.
Top news aggregators have come under the regulatory microscope since President Trump took office because of their key role in filtering news on smartphones.
In February, FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson sent a warning letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook after MRC published a bombshell analysis unveiling Apple News’s alleged bias in favor of left-leaning outlets.
In April, a separate analysis conducted by AllSides — a nonpartisan group that classifies news outlets according to their political leanings — found that Google News, Apple News and other aggregators draw just a fraction of their articles from right-leaning news sources like The Post and Fox News.
