Last Thursday, MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle met up with actor Rainn Wilson of The Office fame on his Soul Bloom podcast to discuss, among other things, the lack of trust in the news media. According to Ruhle, history began when Donald Trump decided to enter politics because she argued that he and his allies have spent their time trying to discredit the media in their attempt to remove people who challenge them.
Wilson simply asked, “40 percent of Americans don't trust mainstream media. Why is that? How did we get here?”
Instead of looking inward, Ruhle saw a conspiracy at work, “Listen, we are seeing a huge loss in trust of all of our institutions. It's the media, it's medicine, it's banking. It's a huge problem. Because when you think about democracy and all of these pillars, they need to stand tall. They need to stand strong. And sort of losing that trust is not by accident, it's by design.”
She noted, “If you remember when President Trump was running the first time, Steve Bannon once said, ‘the goal is to blow the whole thing up.’”
Republican distrust in the media has been on the steady decline. The last time GOP trust in the media was above 40 percent was 2003, back when Trump was still a Democrat. The last time it was above 30 percent was 2015. For independents, trust in the media has only been above 40 percent one time since 2009. So, clearly there is more than just a MAGA influence operation going on.
Nevertheless, Ruhle added, “And so I think that you've got mistakes made or things starting to slip while at the same time there's a concerted effort to destroy the media because the media, the media, the news media is, in my opinion, the last light of defense of holding power accountable.”
Ruhle also claimed, “President Trump won and tons of people were shocked or angry or frustrated, and they're tuning out. And at the same time you have the Elon Musk media machine because they want you to leave traditional media and they want you to go to X, which is a bastion of misinformation. Where there is no fact checking. So it's a perfect storm of people saying, ‘I'm angry, I'm frustrated, I'm tuning out, I'm disconnecting.’”
Still, Ruhle insisted, “we have to simply cover what this White House is doing. And I think if we do that, right, there's that saying, you know, trust is gained in raindrops and it's lost in buckets, and it's not a—yes. You're not incorrect that the media has lost trust.”
Ruhle never did explain how she and her colleagues could go about regaining that trust. Wilson would go on to push back and claim that the media’s intense desire to hold Trump accountable contrasts with the lack of intensity they showed during the Biden years. While Wilson sought be a gracious host and spare Ruhle from criticism on that front, the truth is that Ruhle was one of the Biden economy’s biggest cheerleaders and acknowledging that mistake could be a good first step.
Here is a transcript for the April 17 show:
Soul Bloom
4/17/2025
22 Minutes, 2 Seconds
RAINN WILSON: 40 percent of Americans don't trust mainstream media. Why is that? How did we get here?
STEPHANIE RUHLE: Listen, we are seeing a huge loss in trust of all of our institutions. It's the media, it's medicine, it's banking. It's a huge problem. Because when you think about democracy and all of these pillars, they need to stand tall. They need to stand strong. And sort of losing that trust is not by accident; it's by design.
If you remember when President Trump was running the first time, Steve Bannon once said, “The goal is to blow the whole thing up.”
And so I think that you've got mistakes made or things starting to slip while at the same time there's a concerted effort to destroy the media because the media, the media, the news media is, in my opinion, the last light of defense of holding power accountable.
Right? And you had a bit of a perfect storm, right? President Trump won, and tons of people were shocked or angry or frustrated, and they're tuning out. And at the same time, you have the Elon Musk media machine because they want you to leave traditional media and they want you to go to X, which is a bastion of misinformation.
WILSON: Yeah.
RUHLE: Where there is no fact-checking. So it's a perfect storm of people saying, “I'm angry, I'm frustrated, I'm tuning out, I'm disconnecting.” And then you have a force—
WILSON: Yeah. Yeah.
RUHLE: Pushing it. And, but even in the last two weeks, what we need to do is just cover what's happening in America, right? We have to cover Democrats trying to figure out what their lane is and how they're gonna get back on their feet.
And we have to simply cover what this White House is doing. And I think if we do that, right, there's that saying, you know, trust is gained in raindrops and it's lost in buckets, and it's not a—yes. You're not incorrect that the media has lost trust.
