News coverage of Trump and Harris heavily favors the vice president, while 85% criticize Trump: Study

A new poll released Monday shows that a review of ABC, CBS and NBC News’ coverage of the 2024 presidential election overwhelmingly favors Vice President Kamala Harris, with more than two-thirds positive and 85% of coverage of former President Donald Trump it’s negative.

Research from Media Research Center (MRC) claimed that the evening’s election coverage was “the most skewed in history.” Analysts examined more than 600 segments, starting from the day President Joe Biden withdrew from the race and ending on October 25.

According to analysts, over a four-month period, 78% of reports about Harris were positive and 85% about Trump were negative.

“The gap in the coverage of the two candidates is much wider than in 2016, when both Trump and then-challenger Hillary Clinton received mostly negative views (91% negative for Trump compared to 79% negative for Clinton),” the analysts wrote. “This is (also) up from 2020, when Joe Biden received 66% positive comments compared to 92% negative for Trump.”

Analysts noted that coverage of Trump focused largely on controversy and criticism of the former president. However, when controversies surrounding the vice president or her family came to light, such as allegations of plagiarismthere was little or no coverage.

“Instead, Harris’ coverage was filled with enthusiastic quotes from voters supporting Harris, which created a positive mood among Democrats even as network reporters criticized Trump himself,” the study said.

There was also a change in tactics in covering Harris after she became the official Democratic presidential candidate. From July to early September, the vice president had “rock star coverage.” However, after the Sept. 10 debate, “networks shifted attention away from Harris by spending significantly more airtime attacking Trump.”

While the MRC study included NBC, ABC and CBS, it did not include data from CNN or Fox News.

The report also appears after Gallup poll from earlier this month they found that the news media was the least trusted profession and was even trusted less than Congress.

Misty Severi is the evening news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on x for greater coverage.