The Taft Independent is a free weekly feature community newspaper published in Kern County California. The Independent covers local news, features, letters, editorials, community voices and more. The newspaper office is located at 508 Center Street in Taft, California, 93268.

Type	Weekly newspaper
Format	Tabloid
Owner(s)	Independent
Publisher	Michael J. Long
Founded	July 4, 2006
Headquarters	508 Center Street Taft, California 93268  United States
Circulation	3,500
Website	taftindependent.com

The Independent is published weekly on Friday. Weekly circulation is 3,500 issues distributed in Western Kern County and Eastern Santa Barbara County. The Independent's website receives 23,000 views per month.

Independent news stories are a source of news from Taft California on the Google, Yahoo and Dogpile news search engines.

The Independent is a member of the California Newspaper Publishers Association.