It has been said, “You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” This verse from the Bible reminded of another famous quote by Gotthold Ephraim Lessing,
He said: “If God were to hold all Truth concealed in his right hand, and in his left only the steady and diligent drive for Truth, albeit with the proviso that I would always and forever err in the process, and offer me the choice, I would with all humility take the left hand.”
If you also choose to seek your own Truth instead of accepting someone else’s, then I invite you to explore my selection of 10 best independent news websites that pave their own way in search of Truth.
Let’s dive in.
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1. Truthout Independent News Website
Truthout is a nonprofit news organization dedicated to providing independent reporting and commentary on a diverse range of social justice issues. Since our founding in 2001, we have anchored our work in principles of accuracy, transparency, and independence from the influence of corporate and political forces.
Truthout works to spark action by revealing systemic social, racial, economic and environmental injustice and providing a platform for progressive and transformative ideas, through in-depth investigative reporting and critical analysis. With a powerful, independent voice, we spur transformations in consciousness and inspire both policy change and direct action. For more on our editorial approach, please read “Remaking Media in the Pursuit of Justice” and “A Call to the Media: Let’s Go Beyond ‘Preserving Democracy.’”
Source: Truthout
2. Fair Observer Independent News Website
Fair Observer is an independent, nonprofit media organization that engages in citizen journalism and civic education.
Our digital media platform has nearly 2,500 authors from over 90 countries, cutting across borders, backgrounds and beliefs. With fact-checking and a rigorous editorial process, we provide diversity and quality in an era of echo chambers and fake news.
We are democratizing the global discourse. Anyone can publish with us from around the world. All we ask is that people make fact-based, well-reasoned arguments and follow our Editorial Guidelines. Democracy depends on discourse and suffers when there is censorship or cacophony.
Source: Fair Observer
3. Consortium News Independent News Website
From the Late Founder and Editor Robert Parry: When we founded Consortium News in 1995 – as the first investigative news magazine based on the Internet – there was already a crisis building in the U.S. news media. The mainstream media was falling into a pattern of groupthink on issue after issue, often ignoring important factual information because it didn’t fit with what all the Important People knew to be true.
Indeed, that was the original reason that I turned to what was then a new media platform to create a home for well-reported stories and to challenge the many misguided conventional wisdoms.
Source: Consortium News
4. The Intercept Independent News Website
At The Intercept, we investigate powerful individuals and institutions to expose corruption and injustice. We see journalism as an instrument of civic action. We’re here to change the world, not just describe it.
The Intercept aspires to drive meaningful change by empowering the public with information to demand a better world from institutions and leaders. We believe rigorous and courageous journalism plays a vital role in protecting human rights, safeguarding freedoms, checking the influence of money and power, and moving society toward a just future.
Since our founding in 2014, our groundbreaking reporting has achieved immense impact, including spurring exonerations, reforming laws, enacting new legislation, and exposing sweeping national security programs that undermine civil liberties.
Source: The Intercept
5. Democracy Now Independent News Website
Democracy Now! produces a daily, global, independent news hour hosted by award-winning journalists Amy Goodman and Juan González. Our reporting includes breaking daily news headlines and in-depth interviews with people on the front lines of the world’s most pressing issues. On Democracy Now!, you’ll hear a diversity of voices speaking for themselves, providing a unique and sometimes provocative perspective on global events.
Democracy Now! is broadcast daily across the United States and Canada as well as in countries around the world. Our program is on Pacifica, NPR, community, college and satellite radio stations; on PBS, public, community and satellite TV; and viewed by millions of people online each day. Our headlines are broadcast in Spanish on radio stations across the U.S., Central and South America, and in Europe.
Democracy Now! launched in 1996, airing on nine radio stations. More than two decades later, we have grown to be one of the leading U.S.-based independent daily news broadcasts in the world.
Source: Democracy Now
6. ProPublica Independent News Website
ProPublica is an independent, nonprofit newsroom that produces investigative journalism with moral force. We dig deep into important issues, shining a light on abuses of power and betrayals of public trust — and we stick with those issues as long as it takes to hold power to account.
With a team of more than 150 dedicated journalists, ProPublica covers a range of topics including government and politics, business, criminal justice, the environment, education, health care, immigration, and technology. We focus on stories with the potential to spur real-world impact. Among other positive changes, our reporting has contributed to the passage of new laws; reversals of harmful policies and practices; and accountability for leaders at local, state and national levels.
Source: ProPublica
7. DAME Independent News Website
DAME is a women-led, independent, reader-funded magazine dedicated to producing journalism that is accessible, intersectional, and illuminating. We tell stories that are smart, progressive, and incisive, for readers who are savvy, curious, and forward-thinking.
Our goal is to level with you; to put words to and make sense of what you’re feeling; to cut through the noise of the internet with insights and solutions that are actually meaningful to your life once you power down your screens. Our democracy is only as strong as the united, informed electorate that makes it up, and we know you have a stake in it. For that reason, we seek to tell human-centric stories that empower connection, build community, and foster participation in our government.
Source: DAME
8. The Cradle Independent News Website
Finally, a journalist-driven publication covering West Asia that represents the tens of millions of regional voices not heard in the world’s English-language media.
That’s not our only differentiator. We are also not owned by any of our donors, and so they have no say over what we write or don’t write.
We chose the name The Cradle as a reminder that the cradle of civilization was borne of this region, when men and women decided to settle in a single (no doubt, gorgeous) spot and grow their food. West Asia is the start of history in so many ways, but today the region has lost its roots largely because non-sovereign states act as pawns in the geopolitical calculations of The Other.
Bleak as the outlook may be, there is cause for optimism. For the first time in centuries, West Asia has within it a group of states and actors that demonstrate genuine efficiency and share common cause. You need a vision and a direction to extricate yourself from pandemonium, but it is efficiency that will help realize your objective. And so ‘efficiency’ is a word I place much stock in. As should you, our readers.
As the global geopolitical contest between Great Powers once more gets distilled into two poles, you will find that the winners will always be those with efficiency. It is because they start with the correct fundamentals: rock-solid alliances based on common objectives; smart diplomacy; leading with soft power but prepared to use the hard kind; respect for the principles of the UN Charter and international law; and a clear vision of the world they seek.
Source: The Cradle
9. Ensia Independent News Website
We all know these are pivotal times. From climate change, to biodiversity loss, to water woes, to off-kilter ecosystems, the problems are rife.
The good news? Solutions also abound. Citizens, scientists, business and non-profit leaders, policy-makers and others collectively have knowledge and insights that can change the world. What’s missing are the stories and the connections. This is where Ensia comes in.
Published at the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment, Ensia is a solutions-focused nonprofit media outlet reporting on our changing planet.
Source: Ensia
10. Common Dreams Independent News Website
Common Dreams is a reader-supported independent news outlet created in 1997 as a new media model.
Our nonprofit newsroom covers the most important news stories of the moment. Common Dreams free online journalism keeps our millions of readers well-informed, inspired, and engaged.
We are optimists. We believe real change is possible. But only if enough well-informed, well-intentioned—and just plain fed up and fired-up—people demand it. We believe that together we can attain our common dreams.
Source: Common Dreams
11. The Real News Network
The Real News Network (TRNN) makes media connecting you to the movements, people, and perspectives that are advancing the cause of a more just, equal, and livable planet. We broaden your understanding of the issues, contexts, and voices behind the news headlines.
We are rigorous in our journalism and dedicated to the facts, but unafraid to engage alongside movements for change, because we believe journalism and media making has a critical role to play in illuminating pathways for collective action.
That’s why we make media engaging people not as a passive audience of consumers and spectators, but as active—or soon-to-be activated—participants in the struggle for a better world. Our platform highlights the voices and ideas not just of academics and pundits, but grassroots participants in social movements for change: the people on the frontlines of fights against injustice.
Source: The Real News Network
12. The GroundTruth Independent News Website
THE GROUNDTRUTH PROJECT is an award-winning, independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization dedicated to supporting the next generation of journalists in the U.S. and around the world.
Our mission is to serve under-covered communities by supporting the next generation of journalists to do on-the-ground reporting and to advance sustainability, innovation and equity in journalism worldwide.
In 2017, The GroundTruth Project launched Report for America, a national service program that places talented emerging journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues and communities. And in 2021, we launched Report for the World.
At the core of what we do is the idea of “ground truth,” which, put simply, means being on the ground to tell the story. The origin of the term comes from NASA, and refers to part of the calibration process used in satellite imagery. When NASA measures something with a satellite, an employee on the ground takes the same measurement. That human measurement is known as “ground truth.”
Source: The GroundTruth
Complement with Emily Dickinson, who wrote: “I’m a nobody, who are you?”
Editor’s note: This is a developing article and it will be updated over time. Do you know of any other independent news website in the USA that should be included in this list? Send us a tip through our contact page.
I’m a freelance writer with 6 years of experience in SEO blogging and article publishing. While you’re here, get the latest updates by subscribing to my newsletter.
