RealClearPolitics arose from its founders’ shared vision of a journalistic future in which a vast array of news sources that defied traditional geographic limitations and ideological differences would be available to any American with an Internet connection.
In the late-1990s, John McIntyre and Tom Bevan were struck by the implications of new technology making it possible for Americans to read digital versions of far-flung newspapers – the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Miami Herald, and the Washington Post on the same day – wherever they were located. With this realization, John and Tom set out to create an online clearinghouse tailored to consumers of news and information on U.S. politics, policy, and elections.
Despite a shared passion for civics, RCP’s founders were involved professionally neither in politics nor journalism. John was a stock trader; Tom was in the advertising business. Like digital innovators before them, they operated the new enterprise out of their homes. Located in Chicago, they provided a perspective from outside the Washington-New York media bubble.
Soon after launching RealClearPolitics in 2000, Tom and John experienced a second epiphany, which would shape the company’s core identity. They realized that the best way to make sense of the rapidly expanding number of horserace polls roiling the political landscape was to average these surveys. Soon, the RCP Poll Average changed the way Americans talked about public opinion surveys during election cycles. The definitive source for U.S. political polling information, the RCP Poll Average provides everyone from political experts and campaign consultants to amateur political junkies a more precise read on the status of the election. The accuracy of the RCP Poll Average remains unmatched and is trusted for use in ventures ranging from Bloomberg Terminals to campaign communications teams in both major political parties. The RCP average is also widely cited by hundreds of news outlets including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times, FOX News, CNN, USA Today, and MSNBC.
Meanwhile, as the political environment changed, so did the media landscape. As the profession’s business model collapsed, the traditional journalism model was eroded as well. Over the ensuing two decades, much of the Fourth Estate abandoned its venerable mission of covering the news “impartially, without fear or favor regardless of party, sect, or interest.” Along the way, media outlets willing to showcase even a wide range of opinion became a rarity.
As the traditional news business shrunk and fractured, RCP leaned into the new technology. Each morning, our frontpage editors comb the Internet for the most significant political stories of the day – and the most compelling commentary. From RCP’s beginnings, the offerings on our sites always run the ideological gamut: conservative, liberal, centrist, libertarian, populist, socialist – views of all kinds are represented on our front page, which is updated every day with written content and videos. Most American newsrooms once took pride in such ecumenism. That is no longer the case, or even the aspiration. RCP’s true “secret sauce” turned out not to be a technological realization or even the innovative idea of averaging the polls. Our specialty was a willingness to use new technology in service of an old idea: presenting an array of viewpoints in America’s intense national discourse.
Along the way, RCP expanded its model of intelligent aggregation. We launched a host of sister sites – we call them “verticals” – in various issue areas: RealClearDefense, RealClearMarkets, RealClearScience, RealClearEnergy, and more. Today, we have 14 such verticals, including RealClearInvestigations. RCI reporters have broken stories in areas ranging from gun control and the government’s COVID-19 response to immigration policy, Donald Trump’s impeachments, and America’s raging culture wars.
For the past 23 years, RCP’s reach has grown steadily while we continue to add new features to better serve our audience. In the mid-2000s, we began offering original content. Today, these offerings include videos and podcasts as well as written material from guest op-eds, regular contributors, and staff-written news stories and columns. We have had a full-time White House correspondent since the George W. Bush administration and were one of the first digital-only publications to hold a permanent seat in the White House press briefing room. Along with our own in-house political analyst, we employ a stable of political correspondents and regular contributors and columnists.
Our alums include reporters who’ve gone on to the Wall Street Journal, POLITICO, CBS News, CNN, Bloomberg, The Hill, and the Los Angeles Times. We’ve also attracted veteran reporters and editors from other publications. Washington bureau chief Carl Cannon joined RCP in 2011 after a storied career in newspapers and magazines. Seasoned editor Tom Kuntz was enticed away from the New York Times to run RealClearInvestigations. Associate editor and columnist A.B. Stoddard came from The Hill newspaper. Longtime copy desk chief Tom Kavanagh was a veteran Washington Post hand. RCP president Erin Waters is the former publisher of Governing magazine.
In 2016, we launched RealClearPublishing, a book imprint that has produced books on political independents, guaranteed basic income, political civility, an anthology of women’s speeches, and more. Two years later, we started RealClearOpinion Research, a polling firm designed to go behind the survey numbers and delve more deeply into voters’ aspirations. We continue to grow and find new ways to reach audiences – from regular podcasts to a wire service showcasing our original material.
The thread running through all our pursuits is a passion for U.S. civics and politics and the conviction that the public wants more than one side of the argument on the issues of the day.
We believe Americans want all sides of the debate. At RealClearPolitics, they can find it.
