Ted Cruz picks a fight with Wikipedia, accusing platform of left-wing bias

[applegrove]

Ted Cruz picks a fight with Wikipedia, accusing platform of left-wing bias

Cruz sends letter demanding answers from Wikimedia Foundation.

Jon Brodkin – 6 Oct 2025 16:45 | 226

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/10/ted-cruz-picks-a-fight-with-wikipedia-accusing-platform-of-left-wing-bias/

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) sent a letter to the nonprofit operator of Wikipedia alleging a pattern of liberal bias in articles on the collaborative encyclopedia.

"I write to request information about ideological bias on the Wikipedia platform and at the Wikimedia Foundation," Cruz wrote to Wikimedia Foundation CEO Maryana Iskander in a letter dated October 3. "Wikipedia began with a noble concept: crowdsource human knowledge using verifiable sources and make it free to the public. That's what makes reports of Wikipedia's systemic bias especially troubling."

Citing research from the conservative Manhattan Institute, Cruz wrote that "researchers have found that articles on the site often reflect a left-wing bias." Cruz alleged that "bias is particularly evident in Wikipedia's reliable sources/perennial sources list" because it describes "MSNBC and CNN as 'generally reliable' sources, while listing Fox News as a 'generally unreliable' source for politics and science. The left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center gets a top rating, but the Heritage Foundation, a prominent conservative think tank, is a 'blacklisted' and 'deprecated' source that Wikipedia's editors have determined 'promotes disinformation.'"

Cruz asked for "documents sufficient to show how the Wikimedia Foundation or the Wikipedia Community determines the categorization of sources on the reliable sources/perennial sources list." A Wikipedia page says the categorization is "determined through public discussion and consensus," and that Fox News had its rating lowered in 2020 "because Fox News downplayed the COVID-19 pandemic, because of allegations that it spread misinformation about climate change, and because it reported on the false concept of 'no-go zones' for non-Muslims in British cities."

Applegrove:

thanks to my cousin for the suggestion.