05/20/2017 / By JD Heyes
President Donald J. Trump has had an adversarial relationship with the so-called “mainstream” media, of that there is no doubt. But to hear him tell it, that’s because the media has an obvious and blatant bias against him. In fact, he has called it unprecedented, as have many of his defenders.
They are all right, as a new study from no less than Harvard University proves.
As reported by Heat Street, researchers from Harvard’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy assessed media reporting from seven outlets in the U.S. and three in Europe for coverage during Trump’s first 100 days in office.
What they discovered was simply astonishing, though long-time Trump supporters are probably not too surprised.
The worst two U.S. offenders were CNN, publisher of many fake news stories about Trump, and NBC (not counting the outright liberal lunacy of MSNBC); these two outlets portrayed Trump and his administration in a negative light 93 percent of the time.
According to a chart published by researchers:
— CBS coverage of Trump was negative 91 percent of the time
— The New York Times was negative 87 percent of the time (why does that seem low?)
— The Washington Post negative 83 percent of the time (again…)
— The Wall Street Journal, which was generally considered to be moderate-to-right leaning, at least on the editorial page, covered Trump negatively 70 percent of the time.
— And here’s the shocker: Fox News, which has frequently been accused of shilling for Trump with the same enthusiasm used by MSNBC to trash him — covered the president negatively 52 percent of the time.
Meanwhile, European news outlets ARD (a German outlet – 98 percent negativity), Financial Times (84 percent negativity) and the BBC (74 percent negativity) were not any better.
Again, these are just 10 outlets out of many.
The same researchers also rated Trump coverage by issues. None of the issues-oriented coverage among the outlets studied was majority positive; the only one that got close was Trump’s handling of the economy (54 percent negative). Some other issues included immigration (96 percent negative); health care (87 percent negative); Russia and the election (87 percent negative – wow, this really seems low!); international trade (84 percent negative); fitness for office (81 percent negative – again, another one that seems really low considering most mainstream media reporters portray Trump as a doddering buffoon).
Two of Trump’s predecessors, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, also got largely negative coverage, but nowhere near Trump’s level. Bush’s first 100 days received 43 percent positivity compared to Clinton’s 40 percent over the same period. (Related: Read The Disgusting “Mainstream Media” Is Helping The Deep State Oust Trump And Should Be Considered An Enemy Of Democracy.)
“Trump has repeatedly claimed that his treatment by the media is unprecedented in its hostility,” Heat Street reported. “This study suggests that, at least when it comes to recent history, he’s right.”
While these are just a sampling, it would be interesting to extrapolate this study out to include more “mainstream” media outlets. I’d be willing to bet this kind of #trumphate is nearly universal across all media outlets, save for the few truly conservative cable networks like NewsMax TV and One America News.
The Media Research Center, which tracks Left-wing media abuse of conservatives and Republican elected officials, has consistently reported that the vast majority of mainstream media reporters and editors lean very far Left, while voting exclusively for Democrats.
And as Mediate reported in October, just weeks before the Nov. 8 election, the Center for Public Integrity released the names of print and broadcast media journalists who donated to the campaign of Democrat Hillary Clinton.
The center found:
In all, people identified in federal campaign finance filings as journalists, reporters, news editors or television news anchors – as well as other donors known to be working in journalism – have combined to give more than $396,000 to the presidential campaigns of Clinton and Trump… Nearly all of that money – more than 96 percent – has benefited Clinton.
Trump bias in the media? Absolutely there is, and now a scientific study backs up that claim.
Stay current on media bias at NewsFakes.com and MediaFactWatch.com.
J.D. Heyes is a senior writer for NaturalNews.com and NewsTarget.com, as well as editor of The National Sentinel.
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Tagged Under: democrats, fake news, Harvard study, Left-wing journalists, media bias, President Donald J. Trump