The Prime Time Primary: How Cable News Has Covered the Democrats
The report compares Sanders's prime-time interview airtime and campaign totals across cable news networks.
SOURCE CHECK
TAP FOR WHYNewsBusters is an opinion-oriented media watchdog rather than a broadly established general-news outlet. The article names its research team, describes the period and programming examined, and includes a correction note, though its institutional transparency and correction record are not established here.
- Source type — Opinion-oriented publisher; this lowers confidence in institutional neutrality.
- Transparency — The report identifies the networks, dates, weekdays, and approximate programming hours examined.
- Author attribution — An author is named and the analysis is attributed to an MRC analyst team.
- Correction history — An editor's note says the figures were adjusted after an additional segment was identified.
The article gives a defined sampling period and specific airtime totals, and it clarifies that the tally does not measure overall campaign coverage. Its findings are based on the publisher's own logging, without independent verification or responses from the networks, and the methodology is only briefly described.
HOW WE SCORE ↗The report provides figures for both parties and explains that its measure is limited to candidate and surrogate interviews. It offers a possible explanation for Fox's allocation but does not include network responses or outside scrutiny of the analysis.
- Source diversity — The report compares airtime across three networks and both parties but relies on the publisher's own monitoring.
- Counterarguments presented — It offers a potential audience-interest explanation for Fox News's allocation, but no response from the networks.
- Omitted context — It explicitly says the figures do not measure overall campaign coverage.
- Loaded language — The wording is mostly factual and not strongly loaded.
The article is mainly a numerical comparison, with little overtly charged language. Its framing gives a possible audience-based explanation for Fox News's airtime allocation and notes that the figures do not represent overall coverage, producing at most a slight rightward tilt.
- Language tone — Mostly restrained, descriptive language accompanies the airtime figures.
- Framing — The article offers Fox News's right-of-center audience as a possible explanation for its allocation of airtime.
- Omission — The article does not include comment from the networks or independent verification of the monitoring.
A Media Research Center team compared prime-time interview airtime for Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders on CNN, MSNBC and Fox News. It reported no candidate interviews on Fox during the four-week period, while CNN and MSNBC gave the campaigns nearly equal total airtime.
The report says analysts tracked interviews with presidential candidates and identified supporters or surrogates on weekdays from March 21 to April 15, examining about 240 hours of programming. On Fox News, neither Clinton nor Sanders appeared in prime time, and their surrogates received 13 minutes, compared with 666 minutes for the three Republican candidates and their surrogates. The article notes that its figures cover candidate and surrogate airtime, not overall campaign coverage.
On CNN and MSNBC, the report says Clinton’s and Sanders’s campaigns received nearly equal airtime. Sanders’s campaign totaled 263 minutes and Clinton’s 248 minutes across the two networks; MSNBC gave more airtime to Sanders’s campaign, while CNN gave Clinton’s campaign a slight edge. The tally excluded CNN’s April 14 debate, which the article says would have added 60 minutes to Clinton’s total and 52 minutes to Sanders’s.
Community verdict
VOTING CLOSED
No good or bad look here
This story reports what happened without casting Sanders in a good or bad light, so readers don’t rate it and it doesn’t count toward Sanders’s record.
People in this story
SWIPE →Vermont senator and Democratic presidential candidate whose campaign airtime is compared
DNC chairman asked about a Fox News debate
Republican presidential candidate included in comparisons of candidate and surrogate airtime
Texas senator and Republican presidential candidate included in airtime comparisons
Part of a bigger story
17 OUTLETSBernie Sanders urged Graham Platner to leave Maine’s Senate race after a woman accused Platner of sexual assault; Platner denied the allegation. Center outlets pair accounts of the allegation and denial with criticism of Sanders for backing Platner and debate over the Democratic Party’s direction. Right-leaning outlets also focus on Sanders’s prior support, with more emphasis on the timing of his call, demands for an apology, and claims of hypocrisy.
- ARTICLES
- 18
- OUTLETS
- 17
- AVG CRED
- 55
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