The Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard published a study last week which finds that around 80 percent of U.S. media coverage of the Trump administration has had a “negative tone.” Do voters believe the negative tone is fair?
Well, according to a new Politico/Morning Consult poll that came out this morning, voters appear to be pretty evenly divided on whether Pres. Trump is receiving fair treatment from the news media and members of the press – 43 percent say he is being treated fairly, and 42 percent say he’s being treated unfairly. Sentiment is split, predictably, by party: 75 percent of Democratic voters polled say the media is treating him fairly, but 76 percent of Republicans says the Fourth Estate is not.
Additionally, the poll shows that 35 percent of voters say they are checking the national news (online, on TV or on social) multiple times a day, and another 35 percent say they’re checking once or twice per day. Only 5 percent of respondents said they rarely, if ever, check the news.
78 percent of Democrats are checking the news at least once per day compared to 72 percent of Republican respondents.
The poll was taken from May 18 – 22, and is based on findings from 1,938 registered voters, 34 percent of whom are Democratic, 35 percent Republican, and 31 percent Independent. 38 percent of the respondents voted for Pres. Trump in the 2016 election, 34 percent voted for Hillary Clinton, and 9 percent voted for someone else.