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According to figures attributed to the Media Research Center (MRC), Apple News featured a slightly larger share of stories from left-rated outlets and a smaller share from right-rated outlets in September 2026 than in August. The comparison documents a change in the mix of stories from publishers rated by AllSides; it does not show that John Ternus caused the change or that Apple intended it.
What did the August–September comparison find?
Fox News reported the figures on October 5, 2026, attributing them to MRC Director Michael Morris. MRC compared August, described as Tim Cook’s final full month as Apple CEO, with September, Ternus’s first month after taking over on September 1.
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| Month | Left-rated outlets | Center-rated outlets | Right-rated outlets | Total rated stories |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| August 2026 | 381 (65%) | 191 (33%) | 13 (2%) | 585 |
| September 2026 | 383 (67%) | 186 (32.5%) | 3 (0.5%) | 572 |
The reported share from left-rated outlets rose by two percentage points, while the share from right-rated outlets fell by 1.5 percentage points. These are MRC’s reported counts and percentages as presented by Fox News, not independently verified counts in the available coverage. The totals cover stories from outlets with AllSides ratings; they are not counts of every Apple News story or a measure of every user’s personalized feed.
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The figures classify stories by the AllSides rating of the outlet that published them. They do not establish that each individual article was politically biased, nor do they measure the political content of all Apple News coverage. AllSides has also cautioned that its analyses rate publishers rather than each story’s content.
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MRC President David Bozell characterized the September result as Apple News having “become even more politically lopsided” under Ternus, emphasizing that just three stories from right-leaning outlets appeared in the counted feed. That is MRC’s interpretation of the figures. Bozell also called the pattern “blatant discrimination,” but the comparison itself does not establish discrimination.
Does this show that Ternus caused the change?
No. The report places the two months on either side of a CEO transition, but a month-to-month comparison cannot show that the transition caused the difference. It also does not establish that Ternus personally made editorial decisions or that Apple intended to favor any political perspective.
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Apple’s leadership biography says Ternus joined its product design team in 2001, became a vice president of Hardware Engineering in 2013, and joined the executive team as senior vice president of Hardware Engineering in 2021. The Associated Press reported that he took over from Cook on September 1, 2026. Those facts establish his role and the timing, not a connection between him and Apple News curation.
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The October 5 Fox News report gives the August–September counts but does not provide a detailed day-by-day sampling protocol or the underlying dataset. It therefore does not support claims about how often stories were collected, which app sections were included, or how representative the counts are of users’ experience. Fox reported that Apple did not immediately respond to its request for comment at the time of publication; that is not evidence that Apple never responded elsewhere.
Other Apple News analyses provide context but are not direct checks of these September numbers:
- MRC’s February 2026 report: MRC said researchers reviewed the top 20 stories each morning at around 8:30 a.m. ET and classified outlets using AllSides ratings. It reported 400 stories from left-rated outlets and eight from right-rated outlets among 530 rated items. Those figures describe a separate period, not the September sample.
- AllSides’ analysis published in February 2026: AllSides collected Apple News “Top Stories” and “Trending Stories” from October 6–19, 2025, at 10:00 a.m. ET each day. It described those sections as editor-curated and not personalized, and reported that 50% of items came from left-rated outlets and 2% from right-rated outlets; in Top Stories, the reported shares were 54% and 0%, respectively. AllSides said it did not investigate whether the displayed political leanings or biases were intentional. Its figures use a different period and method, so they do not corroborate MRC’s September result.
To compare audits fairly, a reader would need consistent time windows, app sections, collection times, personalization status, denominators, rating systems, and distinctions between outlet ratings and individual article content. The available September report does not supply all of those details.
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