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Outlet profile

The Hill (Opinion)

U.S. center (deliberately mixed)

Owned byNexstar Media Group, a large publicly traded broadcast company that owns roughly 200 U.S. television stations; acquired The Hill in 2021 for $130 million from the Finkelstein family
FundingPrimarily digital advertising revenue, as part of Nexstar Media Group's broader commercial media portfolio
On the administrationmixed

Background

The Hill was founded in 1994 by Democratic financier Jerry Finkelstein and New York Times reporter Martin Tolchin, with early backing from then-Representative Gary Ackerman, and was created to cover the U.S. Congress closely for the political professional class — lobbyists, staffers, and lawmakers. Originally a weekly publication, it expanded to daily congressional-workweek publishing in 2003 and later grew into a large digital news site covering the full federal government. After Jerry Finkelstein's death in 2012, his son James Finkelstein ran the outlet; critics alleged he monitored coverage to avoid angering Donald Trump during the first term, and the outlet employed columnist John Solomon, whose pieces drew internal and external criticism for misleading claims before he departed in 2019. In 2021, Nexstar Media Group acquired The Hill for $130 million, marking a shift to corporate broadcast ownership. Under Nexstar, editorial tensions have surfaced: in 2023–2025, the company was sued by Trump's Truth Social over a reporting error, and after settling, it fired the reporter involved — with sources telling Semafor that the firing was part of the settlement arrangement, which Nexstar denied. Staff have also expressed concern about Nexstar tightening editorial oversight. The opinion section has maintained a wide-spectrum contributor model, publishing both pointed criticism of the Trump administration and columns from conservative commentators, reflecting The Hill's long-standing positioning as a forum for the D.C. political class rather than an ideologically unified editorial voice.

Sources

  1. The Hill (newspaper) — Wikipedia
  2. Nexstar acquires The Hill for $130 million — MD/DC Press Association
  3. How Nexstar dodged a Trump lawsuit — Semafor
  4. Newsletter: Nexstar fired a journalist at The Hill to appease Trump — NewsGuild
  5. The Hill — Media Bias/Fact Check
  6. The Hill Media Bias — AllSides
  7. The Hill — Influence Watch

Profile compiled 2026-08-12; refreshed when ownership, funding, or the administration changes.

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