RealClearPolitics (Aggregator)

NOTE: This rating is for RealClearPolitics' homepage news aggregation as of March 2025. Content in RealClearPolitics' Articles section is rated separately.

• July 2025 Analysis: RealClearPolitics' News Aggregation Moves Slightly Right
• Feb. 2025 Editorial Review: AllSides Upholds Center Rating for RCP's Aggregator, Original Content Rated Separately
• Jan. 2023 AllSides Analysis Confirms Center Bias; Displays Slightly More Sources on the Right 
• July 2021 Independent Review: Fact Check Review Also Shares Center Bias  
• Sept. 2020 Editorial Review: RCP Has Mostly Center Bias 
• April 2020 Independent Review: RCP Has Center Bias

RealClearPolitics' News Aggregation Moves Slightly Right: July 2025 Analysis

An AllSides analysis of RealClearPolitics' news aggregation in July 2025 found that it displayed more sources with an AllSides Media Bias Rating™ on the right than the left or center, breaking with the majority of other news aggregators, which tend to curate more from the left. This resulted in AllSides moving RCP's Bias Meter rating from 0.16 to 0.17.

In July 2025, RealClearPolitics curated:

• 23% from outlets AllSides rates Left 
• 11% from outlets rated Lean Left 
• 14% Center
• 22% Right
• 21% Lean Right

Note: Percentages are rounded to whole numbers; totals may not sum exactly due to rounding.

Of the 315 total articles analyzed, the top five sources appearing the most often were New York Post Opinion (Right bias), MSNBC (Left bias), RealClearPolitics’ original content (Lean Right bias), Washington Examiner (Lean Right bias), and The Guardian (Left bias).

The results of the 2025 AllSides RealClearPolitics Analysis were fairly consistent with AllSides’ 2023 analysis of RealClearPolitics, though it did curate more on the right in 2025. It found a 7% gain in Right-rated outlets, 1% gain in Lean Right rated outlets, a 10% gain in Left-rated outlets, an 8% drop in Center outlets, and 7% drop in Lean Left-rated outlets. 

Feb. 2025 Editorial Review: AllSides Upholds Center Rating for RCP’s Aggregator, Original Content Rated Separately 

In Feb. 2025, AllSides conducted an Editorial Review of RealClearPolitics' news aggregator and original content. The six-person panel decided to uphold the existing Center (0.16) rating for RCP’s news aggregator, while assigning a separate rating to its original content.

A Right reviewer found the aggregator to be balanced, while both a Center and Left reviewer noted the selection of articles slightly favored sources on the right over those on the left. However, the panel agreed that the aggregator provides a range of perspectives and remains relatively balanced overall.

2023 AllSides Analysis: RealClearPolitics is Center; Displays Slightly More Sources on the Right

AllSides found RealClearPolitics to be largely balanced in a Jan. 2023 media bias analysis, confirming our Center media bias rating for RCP. 

AllSides examined 622 curated articles that appeared on RCP’s homepage from January 15-28, 2023. Of those articles, 32% were from sources AllSides rates as on the left and 35% were from sources on the right – indicating a very slight rightward lean by the outlet.

A total of 198 articles were from sources on the left and 219 from sources on the right. Of those, 13% of articles were from Left-rated sources, 18% from Lean Left-rated sources, 22% from Center-rated sources, 20% from Lean Right-rated sources, and 15% from Right-rated sources. 

Thirty-six percent of the outlets featured in the Morning and Evening Editions in the two-week period were from outlets rated Lean Left or Left, 38% were from outlets rated Lean Right or Right, 19% were from outlets rated Center, and 10% were Not Rated. 

Washington Examiner (rated Lean Right at the time of analysis) made up 6% of the stories curated on RCP’s homepage over the two-week period. RealClearPolitics original content and the New York Post (rated Lean Right at the time of analysis) each made up 5% of stories curated on RCP’s homepage. 

Learn more about the AllSides RealClearPolitics Bias Analysis™ and get full results here.

As of 2024, AllSides had analyzed the bias of multiple news aggregators and found most of them Lean Left.

RealClearPolitics Fact Check Rated Center in July 2021 Independent Review

RealClearPolitics fact-checking section has a Center bias, according to a July 2021 independent review by AllSides staff. 

RealClearPolitics Rated Center in Sept. 2020 Editorial Review

On Sept. 25, 2020, the AllSides team, which contains people across the political spectrum, conducted an Editorial Review of RealClearPolitics. Overall, readers will get a mixture of left and right views when visiting RealClearPolitics.com, so the site gets a Center bias rating; however, the team agreed that content on RealClearPolitics' "Articles" section has more of a Lean Right bias.

During the Editorial Review, there was a general consensus among the AllSides team that RealClearPolitics' homepage of curated articles is very balanced, featuring an equal number of stories (typically, opinion pieces) from left media outlets/writers and right media outlets/writers. RealClearPolitics does not hide or obscure the left or right view, and displays content from both sides very equally. RealClearPolitics frequently showcases opposing views side-by-side.

At the time of review, content from Elle Magazine (rated Lean Left at the time of review) appeared right next to content from The Federalist (Right bias); commentary from someone criticizing the Black Lives Matter organization appeared right next to a video of Bernie Sanders criticizing President Trump; an article about critical race theory activists "destroying STEM high school" (Asra Nomani, Quillette, Lean Right at the time of review) appeared right next to an article declaring "Telling the Truth About Slavery Is Not 'Indoctrination' (Clint Smith, The Atlantic, Lean Left); an article about "How Louisville Can Still Get Justice for Breonna Taylor (Travis Waldron, HuffPost, Left) appeared right next to a piece declaring "Breonna Taylor Grand Jury Simply Followed the Facts" (James Gagliano, DC Examiner, Lean Right at the time). AllSides rates the bias of as many individual writers that appear on RealClearPolitics as possible so that readers can more easily assess the bias of individual articles.

April 2020 Independent Review

An AllSides independent review in April 2020 found that RealClearPolitics prominently includes commentary from all sides of the political spectrum, linking to a variety of commentators on sites from the left and right, including The New Yorker, CNN Opinion, The Federalist, The Nation, and the Washington Times.

RealClearPolitics was founded in 2000 in Chicago by former options trader John McIntyre and former advertising agency account executive Tom Bevan. The site includes political news, op-eds, and commentary. It also publishes aggregation of polling data during election seasons. According to its About page,

"At RealClearPolitics (RCP) we’re dedicated to providing our readers with better, more insightful analysis of the most important news and policy issues of the day. RCP’s daily editorial curation and original reporting present balanced, non-partisan analysis that empowers our readers to stay informed."

Third-Party Claims of Bias

During the 2008 United States presidential election, The Wall Street Journal referred to RealClearPolitics as "nonpartisan" multiple times. The New York Times referred to its polling as a "nonpartisan tally." An October 2019 article in The Daily Beast claimed Real Clear Media managed a Facebook page of "far-right memes and Islamophobic smears" called "Conservative Country." Anand Ramanujan, RealClear CTO, said the company created a website, ConservativeCountry.net, that was affiliated with the Facebook page "as part of an effort to understand the flow of traffic from social media—particularly Facebook—to political websites."

Philosophy and Bias of RealClear Founders

Site founder John McIntyre has said, "I'm not really a die-hard Republican because my interests are less on social issues, more on taxing and spending. ... But I definitely don't want the government telling me what to do with my property... Nevertheless, any political junkie—even a liberal—would enjoy our site because the topics we choose are current." In a 2008 interview with the Chicago Tribune, McIntyre said, "We're trying to pull together the best political stories, op-eds, news analyses, editorials out there. The proliferation of content is enormous. Part of what we're trying to do is distill it in a clear, simple way for people who don't have hours to spend searching the Net". In a 2003 interview with the conservative magazine Human Events, McIntyre reportedly described the philosophy behind the website as being based on "freedom" and "common-sense values." Founder Tom Bevan also said: "We think debate on the issues is a very important thing. We post a variety of opinions ... we have a frustration all conservatives have ... the bias in media against conservatives, religious conservatives, [and] Christian conservatives".

RealClearPolitics was founded in 2000 by Tom Bevan and John McIntyre. They are a part of the RealClear brand that includes 14 other websites. In 2007, Forbes Media took a 51% equity stake in RealClear Holdings. In 2015, Crest Media, which owns the Middle East news outlet Al-Monitor, and the original owners bought out a large equity stake that had been possessed by Forbes Media. Crest Media was founded by the president and chairman of Crest Investment Company Jamal Daniel. Financing and ownership information last updated February 8, 2020