The company went public in 2003, after its first big acquisition. Sanchez and Resendiz are able to execute their stories because of their investigative skills and due to an ingrained conception of themselves as accountability journalists. On March 1, 2021, the channel was relaunched from WGN America into NewsNation, a cable news network named after its flagship news program. Of course, consolidation is in Nexstars interest, too. The vast majority of local TV stations nationwide are now owned by one of those big broadcasters. Low ratings are only part of NewsNations problem: The brand is also suffering from internal dissent from new and long-time Nexstar employees who believe NewsNation isnt living up to its promise to deliver straightforward news. However, in 2020 they . They have recently gained another digital reporter and a California correspondent. But the constant pressure to deliver content keeps producers and reporters in a daily churn that does not allow them time for longer or more complicated projectsthe kind of quality coverage that benefits the public. Lyons' departure was announced by Nexstar CEO Perry Sook, according to Robert Feder, who writes about the Chicago media business. Sook has declared that Nexstar has the largest news gathering organization in the country, and staff at the corporate headquarters, in Irving, Texas, refer to their vast network as the Nexstar Nation.. These new bureaus are both a service to local residents and a relatively modest investment: the Jefferson City, Missouri, bureau, for example, which opened this year, has a single full-time reporter who can reach some 2.5 million viewers in at least four Missouri markets. According to Open Secrets, Nexstar Media group gave more money to Republicans in the 2018 election cycle (45% to Democrats, 55% to Republicans). Nexstar operates traditional media as well as digital and mobile media platforms. The two cover an enormous radiusoften driving multiple hours to cover a storyand usually write between two and four pieces a day, mostly related to migration. Ranking the media from liberal to conservative, based on their audiences. Nexstar Media Group has a responsibility to avoid spreading misinformation to potentially millions of Americans through this type of sloppy reporting. In recent months, Nexstar has added 8.5 million subscribers for NewsNation on over-the-top TV services such as Hulu, and 200,000 subscribers on traditional cable and satellite providers, offsetting losses due to cord-cutting. DC It now has 199 stations across the United States, including NewsNation, a cable outlet based in Chicago that the company envisions as a competitor to Fox News, CNN and MSNBC. In review, the KTLA website publishes news about Los Angeles and surrounding areas. 02/16/21 9:54 AM EST, Article The number of nightly viewers in the 25-to-54 age group preferred by advertisers for news programming has been in the range of 9,000 viewers nowhere near the 100,000 viewers in the demographic that Nexstar has targeted. NEW YORK (AP) Republican presidential contenders typically fight for prime speaking slots at the Conservative Political Action Conference. When I asked about accountability reporting, Rich Graziano, the general manager, told me that investigating government institutions is not his main priority for WTNH. The simmering co Sean Compton, the Nexstar executive overseeing the operation, is longtime friends with former President Trump and his leading TV cheerleader, Fox News host Sean Hannity. In March, WGN America changed its name to NewsNation, and currently has five hours of news programming a night, which is repeated for West Coast viewers. This spring, WTNH added even more hours of news programming, likely in a move to increase revenue. One question that ended up on the editing room floor was what Trump planned to do if he lost the election, a legitimate query as he was behind in the polls and ultimately defeated by President Biden in November. NewsNation, previously named WGN America, had been positioned by Nexstar at its debut last year as a just-the-facts news channel. See all Least Biased Sources. Right Bias: How we rate the bias of media sources. The network also hired Ashleigh Banfield, a veteran of CNN and MSNBC, to host a nightly newsmaker interview program at 10 p.m. Eastern. Matthew Keys is an award-winning journalist who covers the intersection of media, journalism and technology as publisher of The Desk. However, Lyons'. (D. Van Zandt 11/1/2019) Updated (09/09/2022), Last Updated on September 9, 2022 by Media Bias Fact Check, Left vs. He is based in Northern California. Lyons did not respond to a request for comment. AdImpact noted at the time that among the top three candidates or groups doing the most advertising were the liberal A Better Wisconsin Together at $1.9 million, the conservative Fair Courts . Ad-Free Sign up We also rate them High for factual reporting due to proper sourcing and reasonable fact-checking record. Donlon does not have an ideological bent on air and presents conservative and liberal guests. Aug. 20, 2021. These are the most credible media sources. Here you have more people consuming local news than at any time in recent history, says Steve Passwaiter, a vice president and general manager at Kantar, a consultancy firm. KTLA.com is the associated website that publishes news and information pertaining to the Southern California region. The recent segment by Nexstar Washington correspondent Anna Wiernicki is largely about how the implementation of President Joe Bidens new immigration policy will work and specifically how the Department of Homeland Security is going to begin to let asylum-seekers into the United States, officially ending the Trump administrations policy that forced people to stay in Mexico. NewsNations mission is to provide news based on facts, not opinions, the company said. Now that the economy is in free fall, the near-monopoly status of Nexstar and Sinclair means that their stations will have a better chance of surviving. For Nexstar Media Group, the largest local TV news company in the United States, the spring brought surges in viewership and declines in revenue to match the rest of the industry. The broadcast was intended to be a straightforward news reporting alternative to the opinion-based programming of CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News. ad fontes media Most Extreme Left Hyper-Partisan Left Comm Current and former employees of the Nexstar Media Group have accused the companys flagship cable news product NewsNation of catering to conservative viewpoints. He said he had not always enjoyed the attempts by Mr. Trump and another old New York associate, the Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer, to pressure him for favorable coverage. The founder, chairman, president, and CEO of Nexstar is Perry A. Sook. However, their specific coverage of Coronavirus and race relations in America indicate a leftward lean with story selection. (In 2019, Sooks compensation was worth $16.4 million, while the median salary of Nexstars thirteen thousand employees was $43,537.). In 2018, a high-stakes midterm year, political advertising accounted for roughly 19 percent of Nexstars total $1.3 billion in ad revenue, in large part because the company owns stations in swing districts and states across the country. Founded in 1947, KTLA is a CW-Affiliated television station located in Los Angeles, California. CIS and other Tanton-affiliated groups have been pushing bigoted anti-immigration claims and conspiracy theories for decades -- and yet one of the largest broadcast news companies in the country is still citing them in reports on immigration policy as if they are providing good-faith expertise. One chart I didn't get to include in my post Tuesday morning on Pew's new study of Americans' media habits was the one below. She is expected to be one of the anchors for a NewsNation morning program. According to Open Secrets, Nexstar Media group gave more money to Republicans in the 2018 election cycle (45% to Democrats, 55% to Republicans). Tanton-founded groups have been frequently cited by mainstream and local media alike throughout the end of the Trump administration and first days of the Biden administration. Retransmission fees now account for roughly half of Nexstars total revenueand the majority of these agreements are locked down until 2022, so this revenue is expected to remain steady or even increase. Nexstar has also hired lobbyists to exert influence in Congress and at the FCC while simultaneously expanding its DC bureau, where its news staff covers Congress. Compton helped secure the sit-down, which was disclosed to viewers. Between 2003 and 2014, newspapers lost about a third of their full-time statehouse reporters, a significant loss. Thats a staggering amount of airtime, and it reveals a contradiction at the heart of the mandate to produce original local programming every day. Company executives have described NewsNation as self-funding, as the conversion to news is taking the cost of entertainment programming off its books. Sook founded Nexstar in 1996, when he purchased WYOU in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Nexstar is the latest in a long list of news outlets, including The Associated Press, that have used CIS as a source without acknowledging the groups white nationalist ties or its years of extremism. NewsNation was launched by Irving, TX-based Nexstar Media Group as a nonbiased alternative to the opinionated prime-time hosts. In September, its cable network WGN America (a former Tribune holding) will launch a three-hour nightly prime-time program that will compete with cable news shows. Nexstar has also invested heavily in its Washington, DC, bureaupart of an industry-wide prioritization of national figures and newswhich conducts interviews with members of Congress and sends the interviews to stations in the states they represent. Read our profile on the United States government and media. What the FCC proceedings showed without a doubt, however, were the hard limits of a media conglomerates ability to truly serve the public interest. In 2017, Nexstar acquired Media General, which ran local newspapers and television stations, for $4.6 billion. Nexstar Chairman Perry Sook told staff during a newsroom visit in March that talk programming was always part of the plan for NewsNation. WTNH staff aim for coverage that resonates, but out of necessity they also end up running items like the hack of a mans home security camera or the umpteenth update on the murder of a local woman. The ideal figures to hold those officials to account are local journalists familiar with state budgets, local lawmakers, and the unique contours of their communities. A poll taken in March by RTDNA/Newhouse School at Syracuse University found that 76 percent of local television stations were worried about losing business due to the coronavirus crisis. A former radio executive, Compton produced a syndicated Trump commentary program that aired during the height of Trumps reality-TV fame on The Apprentice.. Perry Sook, Nexstars CEO, isnt as worried as youd think, though. Yet on February 16, one syndicated Nexstar piece aired an interview with a representative of CIS with no reference to the organizations extremist views. Former state Supreme Court Judge Dan Kelly, a conservative candidate, is projected to advance to the April 4 general election in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, where he will face liberal judge . That night they purchased the domain name BorderReport.com, and soon afterward Sandra Sanchez and Julian Resendiz, two veteran newspaper journalists, were hired to report for the new site. Nexstar may well stay the course, or even thrive, but the public will need more than a broadcast of a governors press conference to understand how, why, and at whose behest elected officials are making decisions. Media Bias Fact Check offers a number of sustaining Ad-Free membership plans to fit your budget! The sale comes after the news that German media company Axel Springer has held talks with two other news organizations based in Washington, Politico and Axios. Stephen Battaglio writes about television and the media business for the Los Angeles Times out of New York. Using the resources of its local TV news operations, the company launched a prime-time newscast, NewsNation Prime, in September on its cable outlet WGN America a nationally distributed network available in 75 million homes with plans to expand it to a full-time news service. In 2018, a high-stakes midterm year, political advertising accounted for roughly, 19 percent of Nexstars total $1.3 billion in ad revenue. The Hill is owned by Nexstar Media Group, the country's largest television station owner, which purchased the publication in 2021. (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Ad-Free Login And the station size, the market size, the geographic part of the nation, it is so diverse and varied that there is no one way fits all., Investigative journalism, Tully says, is important to viewers in some markets and less so in others, and it is up to station managers to gauge demand. CIS Executive Director Mark Krikorian has spent years attacking immigrants, both documented and undocumented. Bias Rating: LEAST BIASED The network has built its brand on promising to deliver high-quality local TV, and the means by which it proposes to do thataggressive consolidationbuffers against a troubling future. WGN-TV is owned by Nexstar Media Group, which owns over 200 TV stations nationwide. In 2017, Nexstar acquired Media General, which ran local newspapers and television stations, for $4.6 billion. Despite Nexstars claims that its consolidation is helping high-quality local news flourish, its stations are essentially left to face the same market pressures as any other. Sanchez is based in McAllen, Texas; Resendiz, in El Paso. As a subscriber, you have 10 gift articles to give each month. But the news director and managing editor of its prime-time news block, also called NewsNation, resigned soon after it was revealed that Bill Shine, the former Fox News co-president, had come aboard as an adviser. Analysis / Bias News stories on the website often come from external sources such as the Associated Press, Reuters, The Hill, and other Nexstar affiliates. Standards & Ethics Statement | Privacy Policy | Proudly hosted by Skystra, strong-arming traditional pay TV companies, forging new agreements with streaming services, one day after NewsNations news director, Sandy Pudar, resigned, Nexstar revenue boosted by political ads, hurt by Fubo TV issue, Peacock to add live feed of Reelz Channel, Hulu to move Boomerang from base live TV package, Report: Paramount rejected $3 billion offer for Showtime, Rush Limbaugh to get posthumous broadcaster award, NAB slams FCCs latest move on TEGNA deal, Next TV: HBO Maxs top technologist Jason Press steps down, Fierce Wireless: T-Mobiles Metro to increase bill payment fee, Fierce Video: Orby TV shuts down, redirects customers to Dish, GeekWire: Amazon reveals confidential podcast plan in mass email, TechHive: Rokus neutral platform days are over, Pocket Lint: Twitter leaks subscription feature in job ad, The Hill: Washington Post reinstates reporter suspended over Kobe Bryant tweets, Columbia Journalism Review: The Faux CNN Threat. Pew's findings aren't an outlier. Under Tribunes management, the channel attempted an expensive foray into original series programming several years ago, which was a financial disaster for the company. They have recently gained another digital reporter and a California correspondent. [5] The sale was completed on September 28 of that year. Last year, CNBC hired former Fox News anchor Shepard Smith for a nightly just-the-facts presentation at 7 p.m. Eastern. The must-watch TV of the moment is local news. For Ad-Free Subscriptions go here: https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/membership-account/membership-levels/, Terms and Conditions Press Freedom Rating: MOSTLY FREE The local television behemoth Nexstar Media Group announced Friday that it had acquired The Hill, a Beltway political news website, for $130 million. Nexstar, he added, is very much interested in that fit theyre very balanced.. AccordingtoOpen Secrets, Nexstar Media group gave more money to Republicans in the 2018 election cycle (45% to Democrats, 55% to Republicans); however, in 2020, they gave more to Democrats. But the programs topics such as NBA star LeBron James tweet about the Columbus, Ohio, police shooting of a Black teenage girl who was allegedly wielding a knife often hit on conservative-media talking points. ANNA WIERNICKI (NEXSTAR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT): Todd Bensman with the Center for Immigration Studies says the policy change will invite a surge at the southern border. Factual Reporting: HIGH All plans give access to our growing exclusive content! Now, without the usual in-person strategiesrallies, events, door-to-door canvassingand with reduced expenses, campaigns may allocate more funds to television. Revenue is generated through advertising. We cant find advertisers that want to take advantage of it. Ad revenue for local TV companies has dropped as much as 40 percent since the beginning of the pandemic. For permission to reprint for commercial uses, The. Employees say there is no sign of a retreat. [6] There was outrage in the newsroom when the version of the interview that aired appeared to give a free pass to Trump, with softball questions and minimal pushback. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/20/business/the-hill-sale-nexstar-media.html. Nexstar is rolling out new state bureausit now operates news bureaus in twenty state capitalswhich could fill those gaps. It's a unique way of laying out the complex media landscape in two dimensions: news value and reliability, on the vertical axis, and bias, on the horizontal axis. Editorially, NewsNation does not produce opinion pieces and generally reports on politics neutrally. When covering politics, they generally stick with the facts, such as this Justice Department probing Trump effort to overturn election. All rights reserved, except where otherwise noted. Dont miss reporting and analysis from the Hill and the White House. Live programming is seen as the best route to making the channel more valuable to cable and satellite operators, and the company has said offering news and talk has helped it negotiate higher carriage fees and advertising rates. Nexstar executives declined a request to discuss recent internal moves at NewsNation and issued a statement defending the stations position. On Sunday mornings, the station airs. WGN America is set for a r Nexstar had a strong year financially, reporting free cash flow of $1.3 billion in 2020, a 100% increase over 2018; TV stations typically see a boon from political advertising in election years. In sum, the news is generally reported factually and with a slight left-leaning editorial bias. According to a Kinetiq database search, this piece aired across the nation at least 24 times between February 16-17, including on stations in Texas, Colorado, Michigan, California, and Florida. According to Open Secrets , Nexstar Media group gave more money to Republicans in the 2018 election cycle (45% to Democrats, 55% to Republicans). 03/01/23 9:22 AM EST, Article Now, without the usual in-person strategiesrallies, events, door-to-door canvassingand with reduced expenses, campaigns may allocate more funds to television. His coverage of the television industry has appeared in TV Guide, the New York Daily News, the New York Times, Fortune, the Hollywood Reporter, Inside.com and Adweek. A bruising presidential campaign and a historic pandemic brought in a record number of viewers for CNN, Fox News and MSNBC. He said NewsNation would launch a five-hour morning program later this year and remained committed to having a full lineup of news and talk programming by mid-2023. 03/01/23 10:37 AM EST, Video & Audio Then, late last year, Nexstar finalized an acquisition of Tribune Media for $7.2 billion, a figure that, includes the assumption of Tribunes debt, The deal sealed the companys dominance over Sinclair, which had tried to purchase Tribune in 2018 but failed to get support from the FCC. Read our profile on the United States government and media. Behind the scenes, executives are scrambling to figure out how to draw more viewers into NewsNation: When it launched last year, around 133,000 households tuned in, according to data released by Nielsen. A flashpoint occurred on Sept. 22 when NewsNation anchor Joe Donlon had an exclusive sit-down interview with Trump at the White House, a rarity for TV journalists not from his favored outlet, Fox News. Open Secrets following the money in politics, OpenSecrets Following the money in politics, Contributions from this PAC to federal candidates (, Contributions to this PAC from individual donors of $200 or more (. And whats happening? Sook founded Nexstar in 1996, when he purchased WYOU in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Lastly, the KTLA website does not publish op-eds. But they were also discussed as recently as last week on NewsNation. And whats happening? In response to the petition, Nexstars and Tribunes attorneys argued that the public interest groups did not have standing to petition, a common legal argument. In 2020, there was nothing hotter on TV than cable news. And regardless of how much an individual station manager personally values accountability reporting, in the end that manager is tasked with keeping the station profitable, which means running more hours of news programming with a lean staff, making it much more difficult for a reporter to spend two months setting up a necessary interview with a government official. The Border Report team is small. Despite its branding emphasis on local news, Nexstars banner projects are designed to share state and national stories with regional audiences. A Nexstar source noted that with the rise of far-right outlets such as Newsmax and One America Network, there's heightened competition for the conservative demo beyond Fox News. In reality, Nexstar says, its stations reach 63 percent of American households, well surpassing the cap. The political news publication, which started as an insiders guide to Washington and greatly expanded its audience after it went digital, fetched a price of $130 million. Anyone can read what you share. NewsNation, with its main studios in Chicago, was touted as an unbiased alternative to Fox News, MSNBC and CNN, which fill their prime-time hours with opinion and commentary. 20005. A review of hosts indicates that more lean left, such as Dan Abrams and Chris Cuomo, who holds the 8:00-9:00 pm prime time slot. Our tools help you to better understand diverse perspectives and reduce harmful, hateful polarization in . The founder, chairman, president, and CEO of Nexstar is Perry A. Sook. The news came in early February one day after NewsNations news director, Sandy Pudar, resigned.Advertisementsif(typeof ez_ad_units!='undefined'){ez_ad_units.push([[300,600],'thedesk_net-box-4','ezslot_0',125,'0','0'])};__ez_fad_position('div-gpt-ad-thedesk_net-box-4-0'); Nexstar staffers also felt NewsNation did not go far enough in challenging Trump during a one-on-one interview last September that was largely regarded as a softball Q&A and an embarrassment to television journalism. Then the U.S. government blindsided it, WGA asks members to vote on key demands in bargaining with studios, Alec Baldwin and Rust producers sued by crew members over fatal shooting, Rupert Murdoch admits he knew Fox News hosts endorsed false election fraud claims, deposition shows, Historic movie lot that gave Studio City its name to get $1-billion makeover, 19 cafes that make L.A. a world-class coffee destination, Shocking, impossible gas bills push restaurants to the brink of closures, Review: A reimagined Secret Garden fails to flower anew at the Ahmanson Theatre, Im visiting all 600 L.A. spots on the National Register. about fifteen years ago, a handful of companies including Nexstar, Sinclair, Tegna, and Gray Television competed to buy up independent stations and media companies. Two Nexstar insiders not authorized to discuss the matter publicly said Donlon was not involved in the editing of the interview and was unhappy with the final product. He called the site one of the very few truly fair publications publishing accurate information down the middle. Mr. Finkelstein said in the note that he would move on to new ventures.. The reporting is factual and usually sourced. Pew has basically taken the average viewer/consumer of all of these media outlets and plotted them on a continuum, trying to ascertain which outlets are favored bywhich side of the political spectrum. 02/28/23 6:43 PM EST, Article Earlier this year, Sook said that Nexstar was already taking in more revenue from political spending than ever before. Nexstar's NewsNation channel is in turmoil as it faces staff defections amid concerns that the outlet is being pushed by management to lean to the right in its news coverage. This year, Nexstar can also count on election ad spending, which is a key component of nearly every television companys revenue. Funding. Overall, we rate NewsNation Least Biased based on minimal editorializing of content and reasonable balance with story selection. Some of our partners may process your data as a part of their legitimate business interest without asking for consent.