Issues@Hand

AFA initiatives, Christian activism, news briefs

December 2020 – Media Research Center’s NewsBusters analyzed ABC, CBS, and NBC during the recent presidential election season. From June through July, the study documented 634 out of 668 evaluative statements made by candidate Joe Biden about President Donald Trump were negative. In contrast, only 4 out of 12 similar remarks from Trump about Biden were negative.

Analyzing the data from the time perspective, 40% of Biden’s airtime featured his criticism of the president, while Trump used 0.25% of his airtime to criticize Biden.

According to “American Views 2020: Trust, Media, and Democracy,” a survey released by Gallup and the Knight Foundation, such bias fuels a deepening distrust of media.

While 84% of Americans believe accurate news is critical to our democracy, 86% of Americans also believe media bias is increasing to some degree, a number that grew 45% over stats from a similar study from 2017. Similarly, 73% of Americans say media bias is a major cultural issue, having increased 65% since 2017.

Of the 20,000-plus American adults polled from November 2019 through February 2020, 22% of Democrats viewed media unfavorably, while 71% of Republicans and 52% of Independents voiced a “somewhat” or “very” unfavorable opinion of media.

knightfoundation.org, 8/4/20; theepochtimes.com,
8/18/20; thehill.com, 8/31/20