When I query the new Truth Social AI chatbot about addressing media bias, it offers what seems like sound advice: “Diversify your sources,” it suggests. “Use news outlets from across the political spectrum, including both left-leaning and right-leaning perspectives.”
However, the AI itself might not be following this advice. To reach its conclusion, it references five sources, four of which are Fox News articles. The fifth source is a lengthy report titled “Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria” from US health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s Health and Human Services Department.
Truth Social’s parent company, Trump Media & Technology Group, released the chatbot called “Truth Search AI” on Wednesday. It’s powered by Perplexity AI, a search engine that uses large language models and live web queries, and has received investments from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and former Coinbase CTO Balaji Srinivasan.
In 2024, WIRED published an article that highlighted how Perplexity was accessing web content against the Robots Exclusion Protocol, and also prone to inaccuracies. While the AI from Perplexity uses diverse sources, Truth Search AI never cited center- or left-leaning sources in numerous tests by WIRED. Instead, it referenced only seven conservative outlets: Fox News, Fox Business, The Washington Times, The Epoch Times, Breitbart, Newsmax, and JustTheNews.com. Even with neutral questions, such as “What is 30 times 30?”, it cited a Fox Business article titled “Inflation Reduction Act Estimated to Induce Mortality 30 Times More than COVID.” Similar evaluations by Axios and the Verge confirmed this conservative bias.
Perplexity representative Jesse Dwyer explains that what I observed is known as ‘source selection.’ He states that “Source selection can be customized for various needs, like internal documentation or domain filtering, which is their choice for their audience. We support developer and consumer choice.”
Dwyer also mentions that Perplexity “does not discriminate against developers for political reasons” and acknowledges that they don’t claim their AI is “100 percent accurate.”
Truth Search AI, however, appears oblivious to its bias, claiming to pull from left-wing, centrist, and right-wing outlets. “My responses are designed to critically analyze and synthesize information from all credible perspectives for accuracy and balance,” it asserts, based on five Fox Business articles.