Apple News is guilty of more than just suppressing right-leaning news. It ran more headlines from left-leaning outlets in March than any of the other Big Four News Apps, solidifying its place as the most radically left of them all.
MRC made this major discovery by analyzing Apple News's top 20 daily stories each morning throughout March and using the independent media firm AllSides to evaluate each outlet's bias. Apple News promoted more left-leaning stories than Google News, Microsoft’s MSN and Yahoo News in March.
MRC’s Findings:
- Apple News selected articles from left-leaning media outlets for 434 out of 592 total AllSides-rated stories in the top 20 of its morning editions throughout March.
- In contrast, Yahoo News featured 400 AllSides-rated left-leaning stories; Google News featured 382; Microsoft’s MSN featured 226.
- Apple News continued to suppress stories from right-leaning outlets, featuring only five articles in March, down from eight in February.
In response to the findings, Dan Schneider, Vice President of MRC Free Speech America, said that Apple News's radicalism is intentional. “Apple News just took the crown from Yahoo as the most radical news app, even after the FTC delivered an official warning to the company,” Schneider warned. “I think Tim Cook is sending a clear message to President Trump and to Chairman Ferguson: Apple is far more interested in pushing radicalism than in providing Americans with balanced news. Our nation cannot survive if most voters are being fed propaganda and leftist myths.”
Apple News Featured More Articles from Left-Leaning Outlets in March than Its Competitors
Apple News promoted a total of 592 articles from outlets with AllSides ratings in the mornings throughout March. Of the articles promoted, 434 were from left-leaning outlets — far more than its competitors during the same period.
Yahoo News, which MRC had identified as the most radical of the Big Four News Apps, promoted 400 headlines from left-leaning outlets. Google News ran 318 left-leaning stories amongst its top daily morning headlines, and Microsoft’s MSN featured a total of 226 left-leaning stories.
Some of the more radically left-leaning outlets that Apple News leaned on for its top daily headlines included New York Magazine, The Associated Press, The Atlantic, The Guardian, The New Yorker and Vox. Other outlets were The Washington Post, NPR and USA Today.
Notably, Apple News promoted negative and misleading headlines, using fear-driven and sensational framing throughout. Among those headlines were:
- “ICE surged in Minnesota to arrest criminals. Many of them were already in jail,” by The Minnesota Star Tribune.
- “Canceled contracts, a failed polygraph and personal disputes: Inside the turbulent tenure of Noem’s former cyber czar,” by Politico.
- “‘America Doesn’t Want My Children or Grandchildren,’” by The Atlantic.
- “Asylum approvals plummet as fearful immigrants skip hearings,” by The Los Angeles Times.
- “Teenager becomes youngest person to die in ICE detention in Trump’s second term,” by The Guardian.
- “The biggest change to voting in Republican election bill could become a burden for many US voters,” by The Associated Press.
- “The world’s deadliest infectious disease is on the rise in the US,” by Vox.
- “What happened when Kansas tried a version of Trump's SAVE Act? Chaos,” by USA Today.
Apple News Only Got Worse from February to March
Following MRC’s reporting on Apple News’s heavy leftist bias, Apple barely moved the needle in response to an FTC letter that put the company on notice that its terms and conditions would be scrutinized to ensure it was not making misleading claims about its product.
In February, Apple News ran a total of eight right-leaning stories, amounting to a very modest increase over several months of zero such stories. Meanwhile, Apple has since gotten worse, excluding and censoring every right-leaning outlet in the country, except for five right-leaning stories from Fox News.
The tiny fraction of articles from right-leaning outlets promoted by Apple News was the lowest of all the Big Four News Apps in March. Google ran 12 right-leaning stories in March, while Microsoft’s MSN ran 58. Yahoo News, for its part, ran a total of 70 articles from right-leaning outlets.
"Apple News did more than just double down on its leftist bias in March,” said MRC Free Speech America Director Michael Morris. “The app’s poor showing in February, promoting only 2% right-leaning outlets, versus a reduction to less than 1% from right-leaning outlets in March, highlights Apple’s blatant ideological bias. Despite FTC scrutiny and MRC's exposure, it’s the worst among the Big Four News Apps. Americans deserve a fairer news distributor."
Apple News’s imbalance favoring the left matters. According to the Pew Research Center, 86% of Americans turn to their digital devices for news “at least sometimes.” With Apple News coming preinstalled on every iPhone, a considerable number of users are exposed to its leftist bias by default.
Methodology: During the time period Mar. 1 - 31, 2026, MRC researchers examined the top 20 stories featured on Apple News each day at approximately 8:30 AM ET. MRC researchers used the AllSides media bias ratings, which categorize an outlet as “left,” “lean left,” “center,” “lean right” or “right” to determine the overall bias presented by Apple News and analyzed the results.
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