Robert Sides grew up watching Colorado news, sports and weather in his Fountain home in much the same way TV viewers have for decades: as a captive audience member who relied on local network affiliates to deliver the stories that mattered to him.
But as a 20-year-old, Sides also knows young people are as just as comfortable, if not more so, getting their news from TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Reddit and X. So when it comes to the future of 9News-KUSA in Denver, whose parent company, Tegna, is being purchased by Texas-based Nexstar Media Group — owner of Denver’s Fox31 — he’s not concerned.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen to 9News, good or bad, but whoever the owners are or whatever the politics behind these deals, it doesn’t change my values,” said the Colorado State University junior, who reports and anchors news at CTV, a student-run station in Fort Collins . “I’m not afraid of any of it.”
The $6.2 billion takeover, which the Federal Communications Commission approved in March, would give the combined operation 265 stations and the ability to reach about 80% of TV watchers in the U.S. That has alarmed free-speech advocates and triggered federal and state-filed antitrust lawsuits, including one that the Colorado Attorney General’s office signed on to.
One of those antitrust claims, by DIRECTV, has put the merger on hold as a federal judge considers claims that it would create a monopoly that would be bad for consumers; a judge on Friday delayed a decision on the case by another week.
But even as older viewers and opponents of the merger fret about corporate consolidation and its problematic effects on viewers, millions of Americans have already moved on to other forms of media. Only 15% of adults aged 18-29 say they follow the news all or most of the time, according to , which gauges media trends. More than three-quarters of that demographic also said they get their news, at least some of the time, from social media. And younger people are more likely to be regular news consumers on TikTok, Instagram, Reddit and X, .
That contrasts with people 50-64, who pay close attention to the news 45% of the time, but who get their news, in part, from social media just 45% of the time. And only 28% of responders over the age of 64 get their news from social media, at least some of the time, but they are the ones paying the most attention to current events, according to Pew, at 62%.
As of December 2025, streaming accounted for nearly half of all TV viewing, , according to a Nielsen survey. The company’s Big Data + Panel measurement also found ratings and viewership across 158 TV networks were down last year by an average of 18% to 30%, and have dropped by about 50% overall in the last decade.
That means the broadcasting companies are fighting for their lives as their majority Baby Boomer audiences dwindle and younger viewers decline to adopt the same viewing habits as their parents and grandparents.
Everyone is scrambling
Trust has also declined. Only 52% of adults under 50 say they still trust national news media, , and Gallup reports that overall trust in news media, in any age group, dropped below 30% for the first time since it began measuring in the 1970s. Young adults are the least likely age group to trust news organizations, the Pew study found
Local TV news has been a bright spot in terms of trust, though. In fact, 74% of Americans said they had “a lot of” or “some” trust in local news organizations, with 85% saying their local news outlets were at least somewhat important to their community, .
That might be because, unlike national networks or cable broadcasts — CNN, Fox News, etc. — local television is all about making honest connections, said Amanda Mountain, president and CEO of Rocky Mountain Public Media.
“Editorial independence is key to this trust, which is why locally owned and operated entities like public media will continue to further differentiate ourselves in the context of a mega-merger like this,” Mountain said.
Angelica Kalika, who teaches journalism and digital media at the University of Colorado Boulder, said part of that comes from innovative programming that stretches the boundaries of TV; for instance, 9News’ Jeremy Jojola offers vertical videos on TikTok, which are formatted specifically for smartphones.
So mergers like Tegna/Nexstar may not work, she explained. “Eating up loved broadcast stations is a cop-out to actual innovation and catering to your audience. … Everyone is scrambling and taking advantage of an almost regulation-free FCC.”
Prior to its acquisition, Tegna owned 64 stations, including 9News, an NBC affiliate, and KTVD-TV Channel 20 in Denver. Nexstar owned more than 200 stations, such as KDVR-TV Fox31 and KWGN-TV CW2, also in Denver, and KXRM-TV Fox21 in Colorado Springs; it also counts KREX-TV in Grand Junction and KREZ-TV in Durango among its properties.
Nexstar is now lined up to own all of it. Experts say that consolidating 9News’ newsroom into Fox31-KDVR’s existing operation is inevitable, likely resulting in layoffs.
9News has often boasted the best ratings and awards of any TV station in Colorado, according to past Nielsen reports. But the station last year lost ground to Fox31-KDVR, which dominated ratings in several time slots for local TV news. That’s despite 9News anchor Kyle Clark garnering national attention with his nightly “Next” program, which regularly invites donations for good causes and directly, humorously addresses viewer feedback and criticism.
Delete, delete, delete
Employees at 9News, including Clark, declined to comment for this story. Nexstar spokesman Gary Weitman also declined to comment on behalf of Nexstar’s stations, including Fox31, citing the pending litigation by states’ attorneys general and DIRECTV.
The Nexstar-Tegna deal follows an aggressive push for deregulation by the FCC and a 2026 federal court ruling friendly to media consolidation. President Donald Trump’s administration has long advocated loosening what it calls overly restrictive media-ownership rules, and current FCC chairman Brendan Carr has vowed to “delete, delete, delete” outdated regulations.
Carr has also said fears of a monopoly are overblown and that the removal of the ownership cap on local stations still only allows Nexstar to control about 15% of all U.S. TV broadcasters.
Denver is the 17th largest TV news market in the U.S., with a metro population of 4.6 million, and 1.8 million regular viewers, according to 2023 data from the National Association of Broadcasters. The Denver/Aurora market is the largest in Colorado, followed by Boulder, along with Colorado Springs and Fort Collins, the .
And yet, for younger viewers and journalists, the future isn’t about the TV news industry’s survival, but whether local news is sustainable, or worth going into, at all.
“Nonprofit news organizations are suffering from budget cuts and foundations pulling their support,” Kalika said. “So how are students and young journalists going to participate in that? We can no longer think of it as competing organizations trying to steal audiences. Colorado has a better news ecosystem than most, but we’re still figuring out what that support looks like.”
Young people remain passionate about journalism, both as consumers and producers, said Laura Frank, a professor of media and journalism studies at the University of Denver. As head of COLab (Colorado News Collaborative), Frank also sees in her students intense suspicion of large, corporate news-gathering operations, echoing what many outside the industry feel.
“They would often rather take a risk on their own to start something so they’re not caught in this downsizing they’ve been hearing about all their lives,” she said. “We may be more resilient to the collapse of editorial voices here in Colorado, with the variety of hyper-local news outlets that have rushed in. But we’re not immune.”
Making news relevant to young people is a constant but worthy challenge, said Linda Shapley, interim president of Rocky Mountain Student Media Corp. in Fort Collins.
“We want to make sure we’re building the skills for our students that still matter,” she said. “They all recognize that social media algorithms are structuring what they see — and they’re figuring out how not to be a tool of that.”
