David Bozell: Conservatives Must Plant their Flag or Risk Irrelevance in the Digital Age

In a revealing SiriusXM interview on Thursday,  Media Research Center (MRC) President David Bozell joined Stacy Washington, host of Stacy on the Right, to share the latest on how the Big Four News Aggregators are systematically blocking conservative media and what the MRC is doing about it.

Bozell highlighted how the "Big Four"—Apple News, Google News, MSN News, and Yahoo News—preloaded on millions of devices, are reaching hundreds of millions monthly. Using MRC's Digital News Tracker, which monitors morning high-traffic placements, they found overwhelming bias against conservative news sites. In January alone, Apple News featured 620 front-page stories: 440 from left-leaning outlets, 180 from centrist ones, and zero from conservative sources like Breitbart, Daily Wire, or Washington Examiner.

Apple stood out as the worst, with human editors (including a former New York Times deputy) curating content. Even rare right-leaning appearances (e.g., Fox News after 99 days) were soft news, not politics. Bozell argued this contradicts Apple's neutrality claims, prompting FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson to warn CEO Tim Cook of potential deceptive practices.

The Big Four News Aggregators shape perceptions for busy Americans—nurses, contractors—who scan headlines. Distorted stories, like misleading ICE coverage, fuel divided realities where families consume entirely different narratives.

Bozell urged conservatives to bypass aggregators by visiting conservative news sites directly. Ignoring biased feeds denies them engagement data. MRC aims to provide a "glide path" for conservative outlets to break through.

This isn't just bias—it's a blockade starving diverse viewpoints of reach. As trust in legacy media plummets, exposing app curation is crucial to restoring balance. Conservatives must plant their flag or risk irrelevance in the digital age.