Today marks the official release of fired FBI director James Comey’s new book A Higher Loyalty and the Big Three (ABC, CBS, NBC) networks already have done their part to boost its sales, packing a total of two hours, 24 minutes in five days of coverage on their evening and morning news programs.
As James Comey’s book exploded onto the scene, CNN pumped the breaks on its “Facts First” campaign to revisit perhaps the most salacious claim contained in the Steele dossier. Specifically, the dossier alleged that Donald Trump had paid ladies of the night to micturate upon one another in Moscow, and that the Russian government had taped the horrific escapade. To date, no aspect of these allegations has been substantiated in any capacity.
A funny thing has happened since the Left began its campaign to drive Fox News host Laura Ingraham off the air: Her ratings are up, a lot — by more than 20 percent compared to her last week on the air before the current controversy began.
The hype for James Comey’s book tour (set to launch on ABC Sunday evening an hour-long George Stephanopoulos special) began last November 2 when CBS’s Gayle King teased it during an interview with the former FBI director. And while liberal journalists are clearly hoping for Comey to dish dirt on President Trump, there was a time when they hammered him as a partisan hack whose investigation into then-candidate Hillary Clinton’s e-mail scandal was sneaky sabotage of an all-but-certain Democratic victory in 2016.
Traditionally, the news media have demonstrated great interest in movies with social or political themes, but so far Chappaquiddick has been completely ignored by CBS This Morning, while NBC’s Today and ABC’s Good Morning America have each featured only a single segment about the film.
The news media’s obviously insatiable appetite for scandal news surrounding Republican President Donald Trump is sharply at odds with their aversion to covering such stories about Democratic President Bill Clinton two decades ago. From March 7 through March 25, the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts aired 23 reports about various allegations involving President Trump, totaling 40 minutes of airtime. None of Clinton's accusers ever had that kind of media attention lavished on their claims...
Saturday’s “March for Our Lives” represents the culmination of more than a month of the liberal media’s seemingly endless parade of soundbites and interviews featuring the strident and, at times, vicious anti-gun statements from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students, teachers, parents and their allies in the Democratic Party. Looking just at the airtime of soundbites in these stories and interview segments, gun rights opponents received 71.5 minutes, roughly eleven times more coverage than pro-gun rights voices (6.5 minutes).
It’s been nine days since Hillary Clinton, on a visit to India, disparaged the voters who elected Donald Trump as President in 2016. This weekend, some Democrats openly broke with Clinton over the comments, while the ex-candidate herself felt the need to engage in a bit of backpedaling in a Facebook message posted Saturday afternoon. Given the blowback, you’d imagine that the broadcast networks would have found at least a few moments for this controversy. You’d be wrong.
NewsBusters analyzed MSNBC’s coverage of the first eight hours that followed after both the Flynn and McCabe stories broke. Within these designated periods, the network spent a total of 379 minutes (78.9 percent of the full eight hours) discussing Flynn’s alleged transgression, but only 21 minutes (4.4 percent) on McCabe’s, amounting to roughly 18 times more coverage of Flynn.
Put simply, CNN has a porn problem. For the so-called “Facts First” network, the President’s alleged affair with porn star Stormy Daniels has become their new missing Malaysian plane with exhaustive coverage and speculation. CNN took it to another level on Saturday, devoting roughly 41 minutes to her Friday performance at a Florida strip club.
At the Jeffrey Zucker-led CNN, they can be trusted to go all-out whenever they find a news story that they deem worth obsessing over. Whether it was the missing Malaysian plane or Sam Nunberg, CNN has proven itself incapable of covering more than one topic at a time. On Wednesday, CNN’s primetime programming showed that with over 149 minutes pushing the Trump scandal involving porn star Stormy Daniels and another 86 minutes on other Trump-related scandals.
A Media Research Center analysis of the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts in January and February found ten times more negative comments (91%) about the President than positive statements (just 9%). Out of 851 total minutes of airtime devoted to the administration, the networks spent almost one-fourth of it (204 minutes, or 24%) on the Russia investigation, eclipsing other major topics such as the economy, immigration reform, and even the gun debate.
Like their counterparts at CNN and MSNBC, many news outlets were quick to promote anti-Trump protests in New York City on November 12, 2016 – and in doing so became unwitting promoters of Russian propaganda. An indictment handed down on February 16 by Special Counsel Robert Mueller revealed that this protest, as well as one in Charlotte, NC on November 19, 2016, was organized by Russian operatives.
It has been a week since the disturbing allegations came to light that Rob Porter, a now-former White House staffer close to the President, had a history of domestic abuse against his two ex-wives. And during that time, the evening newscasts of the major network news outlets (ABC, CBS, and NBC) had dedicated almost a combined hour to the story. But when it came to similar accusations against congressional Democrats, they couldn’t be bothered.
To create hype for his network’s Olympics coverage, NBC’s Keir Simmons decided it would be a good idea to play bumper cars in a North Korean amusement park. “They’re ruthless, these guys,” Simmons joked in the June 6 Today segment, about the other bumper car drivers – in a country that is legitimately ruthless to its own people. Not once in the segment did Simmons use that word to describe Kim Jong Un’s regime. But this isn’t the first time that NBC News has run a report that bordered dangerously close on propaganda for a foreign dictatorship.
When Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, in a January 11 press conference, belittled the $1,000 bonus Walmart workers that were going to get (via the tax cut) as mere “crumbs” CNN and MSNBC offered the elitist comment a mere 17 seconds in a week’s worth of coverage.
The FBI was caught off guard Monday when Deputy Director Andrew McCabe decided to kick off his retirement early and resigned his post with little fanfare. Speculation swirled over why he chose that day to call it quits but the liberal networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) decided only one person was really to blame: President Trump and his desire to obstruct justice. That despite the fact that other close sources cited a harsh Inspector General investigation report coming down the pike.
Early Thursday night, the White House released the parameters of an immigration plan being sent to Congress, which included legalizating 1.8 million illegal immigrants. However, this dramatic attempt at a compromise fell on deaf ears at CNN. From 5:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. Eastern, CNN devoted an astonishing 11 times more coverage to the Trump-Russia probe, discrediting the Peter Strzok-Lisa Page scandal, and obsessing over porn star Stormy Daniels than the immigration plan.
As many as five months worth of texts between two anti-Trump officials at the FBI are missing, but ABC and NBC have yet to report on this stunning development. The missing texts story first broke on Sunday night (at that point it was thought to be only 400 missing messages) and while Fox News was on top of story, the Big Three (ABC, CBS, NBC) stories had completely ignored it – until CBS This Morning finally arrived on it in a three-minute Paula Reid segment on Tuesday’s show.
Efforts by President Donald Trump and Republicans to secure the border and let Americans keep more of their money sent the liberal media into hysterics over the past month. On MSNBC, the President was called a “white supremacist” who was a “danger to non-white people” for wanting to tighten immigration enforcement. The following is a collection of the most heinous outbursts from liberal journalists and celebrities over the past month.
A Media Research Center study of every broadcast evening news story about the Trump administration in 2017 found the new President was by far the biggest story of the year, accounting for one out of every three minutes of evening news airtime; the tone of coverage was incessantly hostile: 90% negative, vs. just 10% positive; and more than two-fifths of evening news coverage of the President (43%) focused on controversies, not policies, with the Russia investigation alone accounting for one-fifth of all Trump coverage (1,234 minutes).
Yesterday, we reported on the massive amount of coverage that the broadcast network evening newscasts devoted to the Trump administration in 2017, nearly all of it (90%) negative. While topics such as the Russia investigation and other controversies were given extremely heavy coverage — more than 43 hours of coverage on just these three newscasts — the networks were nearly silent when it came to a number of Trump administration accomplishments. This article documents some key examples.
The Big Three (ABC, CBS, NBC) networks engaged in a feeding frenzy over Michael Wolff’s gossip-filled book, as they ate up the salacious details in Fire and Fury. From January 3 through January 9, the networks stuffed their evening and morning programs with over two hours of coverage of the Wolff book and the subsequent fallout for former Donald Trump aide Stephen Bannon.
In another baffling display of disconnect, CBS News blamed President Trump’s low poll numbers on Republican voters being pro-ObamaCare. During the December 27 CBS This Morning, National Correspondent Chip Reid announced that Trump’s push to repeal ObamaCare “could hurt many of his own supporters.”
All this week, NewsBusters is recounting the most obnoxious liberal bias of 2017. Monday, we presented the most outrageous examples of journalists fawning over liberal or left-wing icons; on Tuesday, we showcased some of this year’s nastiest attacks on Republicans or conservatives; Wednesday, we highlighted the media’s freak-out over President Donald Trump; and yesterday was a look at the stupidest quotes of the year. Today, we finish the series with some of the most outlandish celebrity quotes of 2017.
All this week, NewsBusters is recounting the most obnoxious liberal bias of 2017. Monday, we presented the most outrageous examples of journalists fawning over liberal or left-wing icons; on Tuesday, we showcased some of this year’s nastiest attacks on Republicans or conservatives; and yesterday, we highlighted the media’s freak-out over President Donald Trump. Today a look at the stupidest quotes of the year.
All this week, NewsBusters is recounting the most obnoxious liberal bias of 2017. Monday, we presented some of the most outrageous examples of journalists fawning over liberal or left-wing icons, and yesterday we showcased some of this year’s nastiest attacks on Republicans or conservatives. Today it’s a look at all of the over-the-top attacks on President Donald Trump.
As yesterday’s throwdown in the White House press room made clear, relations between the President and the press corps are as bad as they have ever been during the Trump administration. But as the Media Research Center has been documenting all year, the media have approached the Trump presidency with unrelenting hostility. Our latest numbers show that coverage of Trump on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts in September, October and November was more than 90 percent negative.
Liberal reporters are scandalized by what they say is President Trump’s effort to “discredit” and “undermine” special counsel Robert Mueller, worried that it could presage an attempt to “remove Mueller, or end his investigation.” But when President Bill Clinton was being investigated by Ken Starr, journalists applauded Democratic and White House attacks on the independent counsel, and frequently joined in themselves.
NBC News still hasn’t reported on the sexual harassment accusations against Democratic Congressman Ruben Kihuen, but ABC took things a step farther. ABC isn’t just ignoring Kihuen: the network buried its own bombshell scoop on him. In an interview with ABC News Congressional Correspondent Mary Bruce that was posted on the network’s website but never made the cut for television, Kihuen accused Democratic leadership for being opportunistic in calling for his resignation.
Listening to liberal journalists denounce Roy Moore, Al Franken and John Conyers, you’d think the media had zero tolerance for politicians with a known history of sexual misconduct. But the plain truth is the media have been complicit in normalizing, even justifying, such behavior for decades – if it helped protect the cause of big government liberalism.
Both Republicans and Democrats have faced serious allegations of sexual misconduct, but in the month of November, ABC, CBS and NBC spent twice as much time telling viewers about the Republicans’ problems. Nearly two-thirds of this coverage (4 hours, 27 minutes) focused on Republican politicians, compared to 2 hours, 6 minutes spent on the Democrats, a greater than two-to-one disparity.
For the past four days, the establishment media have provided intensive coverage of the scandal involving Alabama GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore, with reporters repeating the damning accusations against the candidate and the “mounting pressure” for Moore to quit the race. The media’s reaction to Moore makes their double standard on scandals all the more glaring: Since early September, a sitting United States Senator has been on trial for corruption involving the abuse of his office, and the media have essentially buried the story.
Exactly one year ago today, Americans elected Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States. But in the days leading up to the election, the establishment news media made it seem as if a Trump victory was unthinkable, as they touted their own polls and predictions as if they were facts. As reporters now thump their chests and label themselves as “facts first,” they should look back with some humility at their performance in last year’s campaign.
Here’s one top takeaway from network news coverage in 2017: Sneaky Russian influence in American politics is a huge story if it involves Republicans/Donald Trump, but a non-story if it involves Democrats/Hillary Clinton. From January 20 through October 20, the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts have aired 1,000 minutes of coverage of the Trump/Russia/collusion conspiracy theories; since The Hill broke details of a Clinton/Russia/Uranium scandal on October 17, those same broadcasts have generated only 20 seconds of coverage.
On Friday and over the weekend, ABC, CBS and NBC reacted with their typical anti-Trump fervor to the President’s decision to end federal subsidies of insurance companies through ObamaCare, but only a meager portion of broadcast news coverage — barely three percent — tipped viewers off to the fact those payments were unconstitutional in the first place.
Over the past several months, journalists have had no qualms about attacking President Trump on a deeply personal level, calling him an “embarrassing” “unhinged” “liar,” a “sociopath” and a “madman” presiding over a “malignant presidency.” But eight years ago, many of these same reporters were offended at criticism of Barack Obama and his policies, scorning the “mean,” “ugly,” “offensive” “vitriol” and “idiot talk” hurled at the last President during the same months of his term.
With September’s news coverage now in the record books, the latest Media Research Center analysis finds TV’s hostility to the Trump presidency continues unabated. According to our analysts, the President received 92% bad press, vs. just 8% good press on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening news shows last month.
One theme of Hillary Clinton’s book tour is that news media bias helped tip the election in favor of Donald Trump, but no reasonable person could suggest that political reporters created a landscape more favorable to Trump than to her. And it’s silly of her to say the news media were one of the causes of her defeat.
It’s already started: CBS’s Jane Pauley rolled out the red carpet for Hillary Clinton, in her first book tour stop promoting What Happened. The CBS Sunday Morning host treated the 2016 loser with kid gloves as she tenderly laid up softball after softball, feeling Hillary’s pain. Of course, this is the kind of book tour treatment Clinton has grown accustomed to, whether she was hawking a book as First Lady, first year Senator or presidential candidate.
A Media Research Center study of every broadcast network evening newscast in the five weeks since the appointment of special counsel Robert Mueller on May 17 found a whopping 353 minutes of airtime devoted to the Russia probe, or 55 percent of all coverage of the Trump presidency during those weeks. The study also found one-third (34%) of the networks’ Russia coverage was based on anonymous sources, some of which later proved erroneous.
In covering the President’s proposed budget this week, network reporters unanimously claimed it “cut” or even “slashed” federal spending. An MRC analysis of ABC, CBS and NBC morning and evening news coverage since Monday (May 22) finds that not a single reporter ever told viewers that overall federal spending would actually RISE under President Trump’s planned budget — just not as much as forecast under the budget baseline Trump inherited from President Obama back in January.
The liberal media are up in arms over President Trump’s labeling of the investigation into Russian hacking and the 2016 presidential campaign a “witch hunt.” All three broadcast networks led their Thursday evening newscasts with Trump’s use of the phrase, with NBC’s Lester Holt saying Trump was “lashing out.” Yet long before Donald Trump arrived in Washington, liberal reporters themselves employed the “witch hunt” slogan to discredit investigations into their Democratic friends, especially Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. But now that Trump uses the same tactic, it’s somehow...
CNN claims it’s right down the middle, somewhere between the left-wing MSNBC and the more conservative-friendly Fox News Channel. But an MRC study of an entire day of CNN’s coverage shows the network spent almost all of its time covering the Trump presidency, with a heavily skewed roster of anti-Trump guests and on-air commentators.
Just a few days after CBS’s Stephen Colbert unleashed a vulgar tirade against President Trump, a new study has documented just how unfriendly late night TV has been to the new Commander-in-Chief. The Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University counted an incredible 1,060 jokes directed against Trump during the President’s first 100 days in office. That’s more than ten times as many barbs as aimed at all Democrats — combined — during the same period (95), and considerably more than both Barack Obama and Bill Clinton received during the entire first year of their presidencies...
CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley is plainly the most anti-Trump of the Big Three anchormen, having gone out of his way since the Inauguration to slam Trump's “falsehoods,” even asking if the President “is having difficulty with rationality.” For taking on the President in such a direct way, Pelley has become something of a rock star among his fellow journalists...
With Republicans set to make another run at repealing and replacing ObamaCare this week, look for the Big Three networks (ABC, CBS, NBC) to blame conservatives, specifically, the House Freedom Caucus for any sort of obstruction to getting a deal done. In 30 days of health care debate coverage (March 7 through April 5), the broadcast networks consistently framed it as a fight between unreasonable conservatives versus more moderate Republicans and Senate Democrats by overwhelmingly applying ideological labels to one side of the argument.
A new American President is always a big story, but TV news is obsessed with the Trump administration — and not in a good way. In the first 30 days (January 20 to February 18), our analysts determined that the President and his team were the subject of 16 hours of coverage on just the Big Three evening newscasts, or more than half (54%) of all of the news coverage during this period. And while most new presidents enjoy a media honeymoon, the tone of Trump’s coverage was nearly as hostile (88% negative) as we found during last year’s presidential campaign (91% negative).
When Donald Trump announced his presidential campaign on June 16, 2015, the savants in the news media weren’t just skeptical — they were openly disdainful of the man who will be sworn in as America’s 45th President at noon tomorrow. Reporters sniffed that Trump’s campaign was a “carnival show” which threatened to turn the GOP primary race into “a joke.” CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin called Trump a “fool,” NBC’s Chuck Todd blasted him as “a political streaker,” and pundit after pundit insisted the real estate mogul had no chance of winning.
With the Democratic Party defeated, ObamaCare set for repeal, and incoming President Donald Trump poised to revoke a host of his executive orders, Obama’s actual legacy will likely fall far short of what his media fan club once imagined. But one aspect of his place in history seems secure: Barack Obama has been the lucky recipient of more biased, positive “news” media coverage than any other President in history.
During the campaign, the liberal news media did everything they could to prevent Donald Trump’s election, but he won anyway. Now, journalists are trashing the way Trump is handling his transition, as well as his early Cabinet picks. But eight years ago, viewers heard a very different tone coming from the media, as journalists celebrated the election of Barack Obama, cheered the “brain power” of the “team of geniuses” he was assembling for his Cabinet, and tingled over how “cool” Obama seemed as he assumed the responsibilities of office.
In the twelve weeks since the party conventions concluded in late July, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has received significantly more broadcast network news coverage than his Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton, but nearly all of that coverage (91%) has been hostile, according to a new study by the Media Research Center (MRC). The networks spent far more airtime focusing on the personal controversies involving Trump (440 minutes) than about similar controversies involving Clinton (185 minutes).
Latest Notable Quotables
Liberal reporters, hosts, analysts and Hollywood types have been in overdrive, seemingly trying to outdo each other in their insults of President Donald Trump. In the past month, Trump has been compared to dictators Joseph Stalin and Benito Mussolini. He was even depicted as a slave owner. The following are the worst attacks against Trump and conservatives over the last month from lefty journalists and celebrities.
In the wake of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, the liberal media immediately launched another gun grab attempt by exploiting the horrific tragedy that occurred in Parkland, Florida. Network and cable journalists blamed gun owners and gun-rights organizations for the “slaughter of our children.” The following is a collection (so far) of the media’s ugliest attacks on gun rights supporters in the wake of the Parkland, Florida school shooting.
“Who doesn’t use notecards?” MRC President Brent Bozell said in an interview with Fox News’s Trish Regan, who was filling in on Your World With Neil Cavuto. “We all have used notecards. Every president has used a notecard. Barack Obama spent eight years using teleprompters.”