LATEST TRUMP REVIEWS, NOT GOOD FOR TRUMP

…Trump on Fox News, the only network he says is “honorable”.

 

Even Fox News is more negative, than positive, on Donald Trump.

 

There is an international, independent, non-partisan, TV news analysis operation named Media Tenor, that has now analyzed 370 news stories about Donald Trump.  These were news stories from “NBC Nightly News,” “CBS Evening News” and Fox News “Special Report”.  They were reports presented between Jan. 20 and Feb. 17. In other words, the new president’s first month as president.

 

The initial word on their analysis is what is stated in the first sentence from Media Tenor’s report:  “The early television news reviews of the Trump presidency are in and they are not good — not even from Fox News.”

 

The reason they chose these specific news outlets is that even though the audience for evening news has shrunk, these three outlets consistently draw well over 20 million viewers and they shape the political discourse on most social media.  Television news still remains a highly important source of information among the citizens that are most likely to actually vote.  Fox News also has an especially devoted following among most conservatives.

 

But here is what this analysis found: Only 3% of the reports about Trump that aired on NBC and CBS were positive, while 43% were negative and 54% were totally neutral.

 

Now, you would expect that the results of the analysis on the Fox News Special Report would be in support of the new president.  Not so.

 

The Fox News Special Report program is the one that most closely resembles the other network’s evening news programs.  But 25% of the reports about Trump were totally negative, compared with only 12% that was positive and the remaining 63% was neutral. In other words, even the conservative-leaning Fox News featured twice as much negative press as positive press, and a large amount in both was neutral.

 

Now the networks did in many cases, did focus on different areas.

 

Fox News focused on the personnel decisions made in the new White House, and the economic news of the new president’s initiatives that are intended to strengthen the competitiveness of US businesses.

 

CBS and NBC focused more on Trump’s immigration policy and whether he was respecting US Constitutional norms such as the separation of powers.

 

Most of the news reports were far more negative than positive. But CBS and NBC coverage of Trump’s international diplomacy was more positive than negative.  However, there were also fewer stories on that topic than on others issues.

 

Of course, the news media’s role as a monitor of government normally leads to negative news. But the overly-negative coverage of President Trump is very unusual. In previous research, the analysis found that President Obama received much less negative coverage than Trump has received for the first 30 days of their respective presidencies

 

This negative attitude is most likely because of Trump’s negative attitude toward the media.  Trump has disparaged the media as “the opposition party” and an “enemy of the American people”.  His only exceptions of course are for the two conservative outlets of Breitbart News and Fox News.  (Not exactly main-stream outlets.)

 

This has put the majority of all the other news outlets and the thousands of real journalists in a very difficult position.

 

If they challenge Trump at every turn, they would appear to be the actual “opposition” he claims the mainstream media is today.  But if they conduct their business as usual, this would just let Trump be Trump, and all of this would occur at their own expense.  So, what do they do…?

 

If this first month of Trump’s time in the White House is any indicator, Trump should expect more negative challenges as he struggles to control the narrative of his highly unconventional presidency.

 

This is why so many of the long-time analysist don’t see Donald Trump making it through a single, 4 year term.

 

Copyright G.Ater  2017