The 2016 presidential election was a time of vastly heightened coverage and misinformation in the media landscape. There was a vast division in the population of the U.S. and the media itself. What was supposed to be unbiased media coverage quickly turned into battle lines for partisan U.S. election coverage, and large swaths of both the left and the right were dissatisfied with media coverage. What lessons can we learn from the 2016 presidential election coverage, and how can that be applied in the future?
Media coverage during the 2016 election played a major role in shaping public perception. It was marked by widespread misinformation, uneven airtime, and a tendency to amplify controversial narratives—driven by the belief that all publicity is good publicity. As shown on Biasly’s Media Bias Chart, news outlets across the political spectrum demonstrated varying degrees of bias in their coverage, contributing to divided public opinion. This article will help inform you how media coverage, social media misinformation, and the campaigns run by the candidates themselves helped shape the 2016 election.
The Republican Primaries
The Republican Primaries are a prime example of how media coverage, both positive and negative, shaped the results. In the Republican primaries, Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and Ted Cruz were the expected frontrunners, while Donald Trump‘s predicted odds were extremely low. However, despite this being the case, with 17 primary candidates in the running, Donald Trump received a highly disproportionate amount of media coverage in the primaries.
“Trump got the most coverage of any candidate running on either side, the vast majority of which was favorable in tone, despite claims his rise was mostly driven by social media and cable TV.”- Harvard Gazette.
This coverage did not continue to stay positive; however, as Donald Trump became a major contender, his coverage shifted from largely positive to largely negative. However, Trump leaned on this by running a populist campaign and deriding the news as biased or unfair against him, strengthening his campaign. In fact, despite this turn in negative coverage, the amount of coverage received by Trump stayed at the same level and, at times, increased, feeding into his campaign and keeping the spotlight on him. Incidents such as the empty podium at the Republican primary debate or the coverage of his rallies emphasized this further.
The other candidates, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio, received the most coverage behind Donald Trump. Initially seen as the frontrunner, Jeb Bush’s media coverage and tone quickly collapsed, receiving net negative coverage and going from frontrunner to out of the race. By contrast, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio started to break away in early 2016 compared to other republican candidates, with Ted Cruz winning the Iowa primary. Marco Rubio received a drop in popularity and increased media negativity after the 2016 primary debates, particularly after sparring with former NJ governor Chris Christie. However, it has been suspected by many in the media that coverage of Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio as the “frontrunner” candidates contributed to the Trump campaign by presenting himself as the populist outlier candidate.
2016 Democratic Primaries
The media covered the 2016 Democratic primaries in ways that differed from the Republican primaries. The biggest reason for this was that, unlike in the Republican primaries, the Democratic primaries had an overwhelming favorite candidate, Hillary Clinton, who received vast news coverage. But an unexpected candidate, Bernie Sanders, challenged the frontrunner from a populist angle, much like in the Republican primaries, but with quite different media coverage.
In the Democratic primaries, Hillary Clinton received the overwhelming majority of coverage yet also had a higher rate of negative coverage than any other candidate. According to the same Harvard study that analyzed Trump’s primary coverage, Clinton “received the least favorable coverage of any Republican or Democratic candidate.” This contrasted with Bernie Sanders, who received far less coverage than Hillary Clinton, but the coverage was more positive. For the first half of 2015, “Clinton got 3 times more coverage, and Trump, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush, and Ben Carson each got more than Sanders.” Yet his coverage was more positive than any other candidate in the Republican or Democratic primaries.
The coverage of candidates such as Clinton, Sanders, and O’Malley differed in that:
- Clinton received the majority of coverage, but it was mostly negative
- Sanders received far less coverage, but it was mostly positive
- O’Malley received virtually zero coverage, and it was largely negative
The Democratic primaries themselves were impacted by media coverage, with the primaries receiving far less coverage than the republican primaries. The Democratic primaries received less than half the coverage of the Republican primaries. Much of the coverage, even after the primaries, was about the rift between the left and center of the Democratic Party represented by Sanders and Clinton. Such coverage possibly contributed to the general election results by causing decreased Democratic-leaning turnout.
It is interesting to note how both the Republican and Democratic primaries had populists running against candidates perceived as establishment, the difference in results, and media coverage. Bernie Sanders received more positive coverage than Trump but far less. Disparities in coverage are perhaps because Bernie had a clear and consistent message, which made for less newsworthy coverage but more positive. In contrast, Trump’s extremely chaotic campaign led to more coverage but more negative.
The General Election
The general election coverage from major media outlets was incredibly varied, but one consistent theme was overwhelmingly negative coverage. Both Trump and Clinton received overwhelming news coverage, which many suspect led to decreased turnout. Even much of the “positive” coverage was about favorable polling numbers and not about the policies or stances of the candidates. Despite claims of media bias against Donald Trump in the 2016 general election, most studies show Hillary Clinton as having received similar or slightly higher amounts of negative coverage when compared to Trump. A later study of the general election by the same Harvard source found that both Trump and Clinton received extremely negative coverage.
“Trump’s coverage during the general election was more negative than Clinton’s, running 77 percent negative to 23 percent positive. However, over the full course of the election, it was Clinton, not Trump, who was more often the target of negative coverage. Overall, the coverage of her candidacy was 62 percent negative to 38 percent positive, while his coverage was 56 percent negative to 44 percent positive.”- 2016 General Election
One noteworthy aspect of how negative media coverage impacted the election was that the media coverage was negative. Hillary Clinton’s negative media coverage was overwhelmingly focused on her email scandal and Benghazi allegations. By contrast, the negative coverage of Donald Trump was not overwhelmingly focused on any particular scandals, even his Access Hollywood tape, but rather a wide variety of controversies. Media coverage was also divided on how to cover candidates. NPR, for instance, had a policy where if one candidate had a negative story, one was needed for the other candidate, and the same was for the positive. Such policies drew criticism for promoting false balance, while other outlets, both left and right, that did not have this policy received claims of bias.
News coverage of candidates also shifted over time throughout the election. Donald Trump’s coverage shifted increasingly negative from the primaries to the general election, hitting its peak in the week after the Access Hollywood tape was released. By contrast, Hillary Clinton received largely negative and relatively consistent coverage. According to studies across the political spectrum, Donald Trump also received more coverage than Hillary Clinton. Yet the overwhelming majority of coverage in the general election did remain relatively consistent in one way: it was largely negative for both candidates.
Takeaways From The Election Coverage
The 2016 election coverage from news media is widely considered sloppy and biased across the political spectrum. While people do not agree on how the media’s election coverage was flawed, large portions of the populace agree the coverage was deeply flawed. One major takeaway from the broadly agreed-upon election coverage is that that year was too much of a spectacle. At the same time, while not every outlet was the same, much mainstream news prioritized sensationalism and horse race coverage over quality journalism. Social media was a major source of misinformation during the 2016 election, regardless of candidate preference. Traditional media often failed to cut through the noise and clearly present the facts.
The media also struggled with being unbiased, with it being tough for outlets to either not be overly focused on false balance or be biased. Some media outlets would be working towards presenting both sides as equal, and thus were not focused on presenting factual information. Others had an editorial board or newsroom with political beliefs primarily aiming in one direction, which biased coverage more towards or against a particular candidate.
The news also focused vastly more on the presidential election than on informing viewers about the House and Senate races, which is valuable information for voters. While every outlet was different, much of the mainstream media coverage in the 2016 election was quite distorted. This underscores the critical need for media literacy training, helping the public better analyze and interpret news sources, detect bias, and distinguish between fact and misinformation.
Conclusion
Some people may consider the 2016 presidential election coverage old news, but addressing old flaws and mistakes made by the media is essential. These mistakes will be repeated if media mistakes such as unequal coverage, false balance, bias, and sensationalizing are not fixed. The media’s coverage of Trump, Clinton, Sanders, and other candidates such as Jeb Bush, Cruz, Rubio, and O’Malley helped shape the results of the primaries and general elections. Through learning about the mistakes of past media coverage in elections, such as 2016, there is hope that the media will not make similar decisions in future elections. Without prioritization of quality, unbiased journalism, and reporting, the future of elections will continue to be influenced by the media.
