The double-standard is atrocious. The Big Three (ABC, CBS, NBC) evening newscasts have almost completely buried Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock’s child support scandal, spending only 11 seconds on it since September 1.
In stark contrast, the network evening newscasts (September 1 - November 16) flooded their airwaves (36 minutes, 21 seconds) with stories of women accusing his GOP opponent Herschel Walker of paying for abortions. That’s almost 200 times more coverage to the Walker story than the Warnock scandal.
On Tuesday, Warnock’s ex-wife Oulèye Ndoye requested that a court compel the Georgia Senator to face questioning over child custody. Ndoye has also accused Warnock of failing to properly pay child care expenses. Despite the issue being brought up in the October 14 Walker-Warnock debate the evening newscasts mostly looked the other way.
The following 11 second mention on the October 16 edition of ABC World News Sunday was the sum total (so far) of ABC, CBS, NBC evening news coverage of Warnock’s child custody problem:
ABC World News Sunday
October 16, 2022CORRESPONDENT ALEX PRESHA: Moderators questioning Warnock about allegations by his ex-wife that he doesn’t pay adequate child support. Warnock did not directly address the claim, but said this.
SENATOR RAPHAEL WARNOCK: My children know that I am with them and for them.
With the two Senate candidates headed for a run-off the evening newscasts have a new opportunity to actually cover Warnock’s family problems but judging on their past coverage, viewers shouldn’t hold their breath waiting for it.
For this study MRC analysts looked at ABC World News Tonight, CBS Evening News and NBC Nightly News from September 1 through November 16.
