KCUR media bias and reliability
The rating organisations do not give KCUR one shared verdict in the records we hold. Their published ratings are Ad Fontes Media: Centre; Media Bias/Fact Check: Leans left. We have seen it on 5 published stories of ours.
The short answers
Is KCUR biased?
The rating organisations do not give KCUR one shared verdict in the records we hold. Their published ratings are Ad Fontes Media: Centre; Media Bias/Fact Check: Leans left. An outlet rating describes a broad pattern in its output, not every article it publishes.
Is KCUR left or right?
The rating organisations do not give KCUR one shared verdict in the records we hold. Their published ratings are Ad Fontes Media: Centre; Media Bias/Fact Check: Leans left. In the three-way grouping used on story pages, that puts it under Left.
Is KCUR reliable?
The factual-reliability assessments we hold for KCUR are Ad Fontes Media: Very high factuality; Media Bias/Fact Check: High factuality. These are outlet-level assessments, not a guarantee that every report is correct.
What KCUR has been covering
Our account of each story, written from every outlet that ran it, with KCUR’s own report linked underneath.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked the Department of Homeland Security from conducting field operations to identify noncitizen voters in nine states. The order cites concerns that the department's efforts rely on flawed data that may include U.S. citizens.
KCUR reported it asWith midterms looming, ICE agents investigate suspected voter fraud across Missouri (opens KCUR in a new tab)
Donald Trump promised a $100 million investment in a Kentucky pharmaceutical facility if Republicans win the upcoming midterm elections. He also spoke about his power in a second term and claimed Google now defers to him.
KCUR reported it asU.S. Sen. Roger Marshall's close ties to Trump may hurt his chances with Kansas farmers (opens KCUR in a new tab)
Senator Roger Marshall paid a Kansas bakery $1,300 to settle a six-year-old unpaid bill for campaign cookies. The original amount owed was $678.75. The bakery owner had publicly complained about the outstanding debt.
KCUR reported it asRoger Marshall campaign settles unpaid Kansas bakery bill after 6 years: 'Better late than never' (opens KCUR in a new tab)
An investigation by MS NOW and Kansas Reflector alleges Senator Roger Marshall and his top aide used congressional staff and government resources for campaigning during his 2020 Senate race. Experts cited in the reports suggest this blurred the line between official duties and campaign activities.
KCUR reported it asSen. Roger Marshall's history of blurring the line between taxpayer dollars and campaign cash (opens KCUR in a new tab)
Senator Roger Marshall and Democratic candidate Adam Hamilton participated in a debate at the Kansas State Fair. Marshall was booed by the crowd when he defended President Trump's tariffs. The debate covered stances on tariffs, the war in Iran, and partisan politics.
KCUR reported it asKansas candidates for governor call each other extremists at State Fair debate (opens KCUR in a new tab)
Who says so
2 organisations have published a rating for this outlet, in their own words. Where they disagree, the disagreement is the useful part and it is left standing.
How reliably it reports fact
A rating of the newsroom in general, by others, and a different thing from the Trust score we publish on each story, which judges one piece of reporting.
Very high factuality
Who owns it
- University of Missouri-Kansas CityOtherdirect owner
- University of Missouri SystemOtherparent group
Where it publishes from
What we have seen ourselves
Counted across the stories this site has published, which is the only denominator a reader can check: every one of them has a page, and every page lists the reports it was written from.
- Stories
- 5
- Reports listed
- 5
- We could read
- 0
- First seen
- 11 September 2026
5 of those reports were paywalled or blocked to us. Our reading of this outlet is built on the 0 we could open, not on everything it published.
We have not seen KCUR cover a story that outlets rated left were largely absent from.
Across the 5 stories of ours where at least three of the reports we listed carried a time, another outlet was always ahead of KCUR: its report arrived a median of 25 hours after the earliest one we logged.
Measured 26 October 2026. Last seen in a coverage list 26 October 2026. Ratings pulled 12 October 2026.
Other outlets rated the same way
Publishers carrying the same published leaning as KCUR, also publishing from United States, ordered by how often we have seen them on a story. Sharing a rating is not the same as being alike.
Think this page is wrong?
The leanings above are published by AllSides, Ad Fontes Media and Media Bias/Fact Check, and we republish them rather than make them. If you think one is misapplied, the strongest place to say so is with the organisation that made it, and every verdict here links to their page.
What we are responsible for is everything else: the ownership chain, where KCUR publishes from, which of our stories we have listed it on, and whether we have the right publisher at all. Tell us what is wrong and an editor reads it.
Report something wrong on this page
Anything we correct is written up in the public corrections log. We do not publish reader votes as a rating, because an unattributed rating is the thing this site exists to argue against.
Every rating on this page is a named third party’s published work, republished with its author and, where one exists, a link to it. Our own coverage record is the section we measure ourselves. Neither is a judgement of any individual report: those are scored story by story, and the reasoning is on our methodology page.