A chicken for The New York Times, a star for Bloomberg: A new “Media Capitulation Index” ranks large media and tech companies

What’s the best scale for measuring independence — or lack thereof — in 2025?

The media advocacy group Free Press (not to be confused with the Bari Weiss publication by the same name) decided the answer was “chickens.”

The organization’s pointed new “Media Capitulation Index,” out Tuesday, ranks the 35 largest commercial media and tech companies on a scale from one to five chickens, from “vulnerable” (Comcast; Microsoft) to “propaganda” (X/SpaceX; Trump Media). That scale, per Free Press, captures “the degree…to which each media company has compromised its commitment to independent news and information in exchange for political favors and higher profits, or simply to get the Trump administration off its back.”

Just two of the 35 ranked organizations — Bloomberg and Netflix — earned an elusive star for independence. (Two others, TikTok and Audacy, have “TBD” ratings.)

The report calls out the concentration of ownership in a few ultrawealthy hands — billionaires, private equity firms, conglomerates — and the threat that poses to democracy. “In many cases, the question is not ‘who owns the media?’ but ‘who owns the media owners?,’” Free Press writes. “This tracker provides readers with an often disturbing answer.”

The index includes companies across the four categories that shape how information flows today: online platforms & streaming; broadcasting & entertainment; cable & telecom; and newspapers & publishing. Each ranking includes a description of noteworthy capitulations, and many also get further context about their holdings, lobbying spending, and “DEI Doublespeak.”

Here’s the full list for the newspaper and publishing category:

“The New York Times would be more positively rated here were it not for one consistent failing at the massively influential newspaper: those damn headlines,” the index states. “In an apparent and ill-advised attempt at both-sides objectivity, the paper’s headline writers routinely normalize the most extreme elements of Trumpism.” One example it points to: a headline stating that the $400 million Qatari jet Trump accepted “claimed the blatant bribe merely ‘strains the bounds of propriety.’” (Free Press also excoriates the Times’ Style section for “superficial profiles and features that fawn over the sartorial choices of this authoritarian regime and its adherents,” adding, “it’s as though the Times is telling readers that the end of democracy isn’t important, as long as you look good in Givenchy.”)

Gannett receives two chickens for, per the index, its brutal cuts to its newsrooms, its decision not to endorse a presidential candidate in the 2024 election, and DEI capitulation. Alden receives three; co-founder Randall Smith and his wife donated to the Trump Victory Fund, and the company follows Trump administration linguistic doctrine (Gulf of Mexico; Gulf of California). The Los Angeles Times receives four for reasons you’ve probably heard about.

In a sea (brood?) of chickens, Bloomberg and Netflix are the only companies to earn a Free Press star across all four categories. Free Press credits Michael Bloomberg for standing up to Trump right after the 2024 election (and pledging to fund a UN climate body after Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate accords). Netflix, similarly, gets credit because CEO Reed Hastings has publicly criticized Trump, funded his opposition, and (perhaps most notably) “built a business that for now seems resilient to political pressure from the White House, while other tech giants are capitulating.”

Meanwhile, here’s the full broadcasting and entertainment list:

In this category, Cox Media Group, which owns 38 radio stations in eight markets and licenses to 12 broadcast TV stations in nine markets, gets one chicken because it’s considering the sale of its TV stations, which would require sign-off from Trump’s FCC under Brendan Carr. Warner Bros. Discovery gets three chickens, particularly for pressure on CNN’s critical coverage of Trump.

In online platforms and streaming, Google parent company Alphabet gets two chickens for actions including donating $1 million to Donald Trump’s inaugural committee and scrapping diversity initiatives. “Google is deeply reliant on several government contracts and is participating in a $9 billion joint Pentagon contract alongside Amazon, Microsoft and Oracle,” the index notes. Meta gets four for “[embracing] all things Trump,” from settling Trump’s federal lawsuit to installing Trump loyalists to its board.

The five companies in the cable and telecom category receive either one chicken (Comcast and Charter Communications) or three (AT&T; Verizon; T-Mobile U.S.). T-Mobile, for instance, is looking for approval of its UScellular acquisition and “‘dissolved’ its partnership with several civil-rights organizations that had helped the company develop inclusive corporate-governance practices.”

The bleak index is accompanied by a supplementary report, “A More Perfect Media: Saving America’s Fourth Estate from Billionaires, Broligarchy and Trump,” that grapples with a better way forward. Margaret Sullivan interviewed that report’s author, Tim Karr (she notes, “there are enough chickens in these ratings to start a good-sized poultry farm.”)

“These corporations exist because of public policy,” Karr told Sullivan; he believes our flawed system can, eventually, be reformed. “There is a genuine popular movement to create a more democratic media system. People should get engaged in this debate.”

Browse through the full index here.