In a rather candid report on CBS Evening News Wednesday evening, reporter Nancy Cordes admitted that Donald Trump gives the media every excuse not to report on the controversies of Hillary Clinton. “Charlie, ordinarily this would have been a challenging week for the Clinton campaign,” she started off saying, “You had several DNC officials resign, more fallout from the hacking controversy, and Clinton's honesty over her e-mails was called into question yet again after an interview she did with Fox.”
“But the sheer number of unorthodox comments made by Trump just this week has really been a boon to the Clinton campaign,” Cordes continued. And numerous studies conducted by the Media Research Center give credence to her claim.
For instance, MRC’s Matthew Balan recently found that CNN’s New Day spent 84 minutes and 18 seconds on Trump’s many controversies, as opposed to the 27 seconds they spent on the US seemingly paying Iran $400 million for hostages. Similarly, the MRC found that network evening broadcasts, that same day, gave Trump more than double the time given to the Iran payment. And Cordes was the only reporter on network news to report on Clinton’s false statements on Fox News Sunday the following Monday.
And it has been like this for months, as research by MRC’s Rich Noyes shows. Back in March, a scandal involving a Trump aide got 8 times the coverage compared to a scandal involving a Clinton aide. The media was all over the misdemeanor charge against then Trump Campaign Manager Corey Lewandowski. But they paid no mind to top Clinton aide Huma Abedin when she was facing possible charges for mishandling classified E-Mails.
Cordes seems to spell it out for Trump, that if he stopped swinging from controversy to controversy the media would be forced to analyze Hillary Clinton a little more. But Democrats would be happy for it to stay as it is, because as Cordes also reported:
What's most heartening to Democrats I talk to, Charlie, is the fact that Trump isn't just starting damaging new feuds, he is revisiting old ones. Just today, for example, he brought up his issues with Megyn Kelly of Fox even those his advisers have urged him time and time again to let it lie.
Transcript below:
CBS
Evening News
August 3, 2016
6:34:07 PM Eastern [1 Minute 6 Seconds]CHARLIE ROSE: So, Donald Trump, has once again made himself the center of attention and Nancy Cordes tells us that's just fine with Hillary Clinton. Nancy.
NANCY CORDES: Charlie, ordinarily this would have been a challenging week for the Clinton campaign. You had several DNC officials resign, more fallout from the hacking controversy, and Clinton's honesty over her e-mails was called into question yet again after an interview she did with Fox.
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But the sheer number of unorthodox comments made by Trump just this week has really been a boon to the Clinton campaign. They'll admit it themselves, overshadowing some of their bad news. Clinton herself continues to go after Trump's business record. She visited a tie factory in Colorado today to make the case that Trump doesn't have to make his ties and other articles of clothing overseas.
What's most heartening to Democrats I talk to, Charlie, is the fact that Trump isn't just starting damaging new feuds, he is revisiting old ones. Just today, for example, he brought up his issues with Megyn Kelly of Fox even those his advisers have urged him time and time again to let it lie.
