Joe Biden hit a shocking new low in polling on Wednesday, dropping to a stunning 33 percent approval, according to Quinnipiac. Yet, all three networks on Thursday again hid the terrible news, something that was too much even for MSNBC and CNN. They bother covered the new low.
As the New York Post explained on Thursday, “President Biden’s job approval rating has tumbled to 33 percent in the latest Quinnipiac University poll, a whopping 17 percentage-point drop from February and an indication of American voters’ deep dissatisfaction over his administration’s response to rising inflation and a resurgence of COVID-19.”
Yet despite a combined six hours of air time, ABC’s Good Morning America, CBS Mornings and NBC’s Today all ignored the bad news for the Democrat. The best that GMA could do is when reporter Cecilia Vega vaguely explained, “The President, we’ve been talking about this, has really taken a hit in the polls because of this ongoing pandemic.”
Yet unlike the networks, MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle on Wednesday night commented on the myriad of problems hitting Biden, noting: “As the White House juggles all of these issues, there was some more troubling numbers out. The latest Quinnipiac poll today puts Joe Biden's approval at just 33 percent. That is a new low for his presidency.”
CNN on Thursday covered the Quinnipiac numbers under the laughable context of reminding viewers that Biden’s approval rating is not above 60 percent. Here’s New Day’s John Berman and reporter Harry Enten:
JOHN BERMAN: When, Harry, though, does a President’s party gain seats [in the midterms]?
HARRY ENTEN (CNN Senior data reporter): Yeah. It happen as few times, if we look back at history. One is when the president's approval rating is above 60 percent. That’s not the case right now. Quinnipiac had Biden’s approval rating at 33 percent. The average is closer to the lower 40s. But still, not anywhere near that 60 percent mark.
Fox News on Wednesday and Thursday also highlighted the 33 percent number. As I noted in a study last week, the networks in December ignored three low surveys, finding Biden at 40,42 and 40. In October, I wrote a study for NewsBusters explaining that, during the same time period in 2017, the networks covered Biden’s bad polling by almost two-to-one more than Donald Trump’s low numbers.
On Tuesday, an I&I/TIPP poll found a majority of Republicans AND Democrats want to retain the filibuster. That also got no network attention. The networks are doing their best to protect the increasingly awful news for Biden, but it’s clearly not working.
The bias by omission on CBS was sponsored by Progressive, on ABC by McDonald’s and on NBC by Planet Fitness. Click on the links to let them know what you think.
Partial transcripts are below. Click “expand” to read more.
ABC's Good Morning America
01/13/2022
7:12 a.m. EasternCECILIA VEGA: The President, we’ve been talking about this, has really taken a hit in the polls because of this ongoing pandemic. The White House strategy this morning is to really try to publicize the ways that they're trying to get a handle on this pandemic.
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MSNBC's 11th Hour
01/12/2022
11:08 p.m. EasternSTEPHANIE RUHLE “As the White House juggles all of these issues, there was some more troubling numbers out. The latest Quinnipiac poll today puts Joe Biden's approval at just 33 percent. That is a new low for his presidency.
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CNN's New Day
01/13/22
6:42 a.m. EasternJOHN BERMAN: When, Harry, though, does a President’s party gain seats?
HARRY ENTEN (CNN Senior data reporter): Yeah. It happen as few times, if we look back at history. One is when the president's approval rating is above 60 percent. That’s not the case right now. Quinnipiac had Biden’s approval rating at 33 percent. The average is closer to the lower 40s. But still, not anywhere near that 60 percent mark.
