The Centre Daily Times, a McClatchy-owned paper in Pennsylvania, has become the first newsroom to organize a union primarily to push back against the company's use of AI-generated summaries
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22 September 2026
Citing concerns over inaccuracies, byline ambiguities, and lack of transparency, reporters at the Centre Daily Times have found that AI's increasing role in newsrooms raises questions about the future of journalism.
Wire services like McClatchy shape how breaking news is reported. When AI starts summarizing these stories, it directly affects newsrooms around the world. The Centre Daily Times staff reports AI-generated content with errors, incorrect bylines, and over-reliance on unvetted AI output.
Nearly 80% of major stories now have AI assistance at Reuters, thanks to an AI summarization tool developed internally - up from 15% before its rollout. Reuters describes the system as a trained model designed to understand news. The model generates bullet-point summaries that journalists quickly scan before adding further reporting.
At Bloomberg, AI-driven bullet summaries appear above full articles on its terminal, with subject experts verifying the output. But the New York Times reported that Bloomberg has issued at least 22 corrections for AI errors, just months after its introduction.
Disclosure concerns grow
Some organizations promote AI as a productivity tool, while labor representatives argue that rushed summarization can introduce inaccuracies, obscure transparency, and damage trust.
Disclosure of AI involvement is inconsistent across McClatchy papers. Some mark AI-generated content as such, yet many reporters worry about inadequate explanation when simply crediting the reporter. It's unclear if AI-assistance merits its own type of byline, or leaves reporters with impersonal summaries improperly attributed to humans.
The New York Times began testing AI search features months before their union demanded clarity on the tools and confirmation that AI wasn't causing layoffs. Some outlets see AI as an efficiency driver, while labor groups view it as creating oversight risks - similar to Meta replacing human moderators with AI systems.