Straight News as Public Service: How The Center Square Fills America’s Government Accountability Gap
Journalism’s most fundamental responsibility in the United States is to hold government to account.
While opinion and commentary flood every platform, the essential work of government watchdog reporting—tracking how tax dollars are spent, measuring program effectiveness, exposing waste and inefficiency—has become dangerously scarce.
At The Center Square, we’ve built our entire operation around filling this critical gap, producing roughly 60+ original accountability stories every weekday that give Americans the unbiased facts they need about their government’s size, scope, cost, and performance.
I’ve been in this business long enough to witness its transformation, and to recognize that this business continues to evolve. I grew up in journalism before the internet revolution and became an executive editor in the mid-2000s, just as news organizations began producing digital content. In that earlier era, government accountability reporting was standard practice—the commodity every newspaper provided.
City hall reporters scrutinized budgets line by line. Statehouse correspondents tracked every bill affecting citizens’ wallets. Beat reporters knew which agencies delivered results and which wasted resources. Clear walls separated this factual reporting from opinion pages.
Today, that matrix has completely inverted. Commentary has become the commodity—ubiquitous, unfiltered, and increasingly indistinguishable from news coverage. In fact, in 2018 the Pew Research Center conducted a study in 2018 to explore whether news consumers could distinguish facts from opinions, and even the most politically engaged survey respondents only could do so 36% of the time.
Social media enables instant punditry from anyone with an internet connection. Meanwhile, the expensive, labor-intensive work of government oversight has withered in so many markets. Organizations that once employed teams of investigative reporters now rely on aggregated content and opinion writers. The watchdogs have largely abandoned their posts.
This shift has infected even major news organizations' government coverage, although one could argue their departure from fact finding and truth telling may be more of a designed feature than a bug associated with right-sized newsrooms. Rather than investigating whether existing programs deliver promised results, many reporters now advocate for expanded government initiatives. They prescribe solutions before documenting problems. They tell readers which programs deserve more funding rather than examining whether current funding achieves its stated goals. This approach—often labeled “solutions journalism”—represents advocacy masquerading as accountability.
The Center Square exists specifically to reverse this dangerous trend. In a market oversaturated with political opinion, serious government accountability reporting has become the specialty product our country requires. We focus relentlessly on documenting government’s actual performance: How much did your state spend last year, and on what? Which federal programs meet their goals, and which consistently fail? When local governments raise taxes or fees, where does that money actually go? We answer these questions with verified facts, not predetermined narratives.
Our operating principle is uncompromising: We produce zero opinion pieces of our own about government policy. Our journalists—experienced professionals with deep expertise in public finance and government operations—don’t advocate for larger or smaller government. They document what government actually does, costs, and achieves. This isn’t ideological neutrality for its own sake; it’s methodological discipline that serves readers who need facts to form their own conclusions.
This approach resonates across the political spectrum because fact-based government accountability transcends partisan divisions. Conservatives seeking evidence of wasteful spending find it in our reporting. Progressives wanting data on program effectiveness get it from the same stories. Independents looking for unbiased information about government performance rely on our consistent, fact-based coverage. By avoiding prescriptive framing, we serve all Americans who fund government through their taxes.
But what’s most important here is that all Americans are finding this in one specific place, through the unique commitment to reporting by The Center Square.
Our accountability mission shapes every editorial decision. When covering new programs, we seek to report precise costs and funding sources. When investigating agencies, we compare budget growth to performance metrics over time. When governments claim success, we verify outcomes against stated goals. This isn’t anti-government or pro-government—it’s pro-transparency and pro-accountability.
Recognizing that our 1,330 outlet partners sometimes need opinion content about government policy, we carefully curate external op-ed submissions. Dan McCaleb, our executive editor and Chief Content Officer, personally reviews a handful of op-eds daily, ensuring they meet our standards for factual accuracy. These pieces remain clearly labeled as commentary—completely distinct from our accountability reporting.
The current media paradox demands attention. Government at all levels spends more money than ever before, yet receives less systematic scrutiny. While pundits fill airwaves with political speculation, government agencies operate with minimal oversight. The unglamorous but essential work continues: attending budget hearings, analyzing audit reports, filing transparency requests, verifying performance data. The Center Square performs this work daily because an informed citizenry depends on it.
Somewhere, before an opinion is generated, some journalist had to document the facts. That’s our role. That is what separates The Center Square from every other news organization in the United States.
Our commitment to straight government reporting isn't nostalgic but forward-looking. We recognize that in today’s commentary-saturated media environment, unbiased accountability journalism has become the premium product citizens need most. Our growing network and readership demonstrate clear market demand for facts about government operations. People want to know how the sausage is made, but they also want to know who is paying for the next great idea designed to improve society.
Some argue pure objectivity in journalism is impossible. We acknowledge that all reporting involves editorial choices. However, through transparent methodologies, comprehensive sourcing, and clear separation between reporting and analysis, we minimize bias while maximizing public service. Our goal is factual accuracy rather than false equivalence.
Every day, The Center Square proves that straightforward government accountability reporting creates both civic and commercial value. While competitors chase engagement through sensationalism or pursue influence through advocacy journalism, we build sustainable trust through consistent, reliable reporting on what government does with public resources.
Our mission remains focused: Document government operations through facts, not opinions. In our country, nothing matters more than ensuring citizens have accurate, unbiased information about government’s performance.
That’s not just our business model—it’s our contribution to restoring government accountability in America.
Chris Krug is publisher of The Center Square, a national news organization focused on federal, state and local government accountability. Subscribe to receive updates on how we’re changing the news landscape.