Donald Trump has been railing against the media allegedly rigging the election against him, and if campaign donations are any indication, he may have a point.
A report from the non-partisan Center for Public Integrity released earlier today indicates that a staggering 96 percent of all media political donations have gone to the Hillary Clinton campaign, totaling almost $400,000. Since the names of those contributing $200 or less need not be reported under federal law, the amount of cash flowing into the Clinton coffers could be even higher.
In the run-up to Wednesday evening’s third and final presidential debate, CPI summarized its findings about political donations as follows.
“In all, people identified in federal campaign finance filings as journalists, reporters, news editors or television news anchors — as well as other donors known to be working in journalism — have combined to give more than $396,000 to the presidential campaigns of Clinton and Trump, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis. Nearly all of that money — more than 96 percent — has benefited Clinton: About 430 people who work in journalism have, through August, combined to give about $382,000 to the Democratic nominee, the Center for Public Integrity’s analysis indicates.
During the same time frame, the Trump campaign received some media crumbs, relatively speaking, amounting to about $14,000.
Journalists shower Hillary Clinton with campaign cash | Center for Public Integrity https://t.co/cwkBIs8RsU
— Jack Shafer (@jackshafer) October 17, 2016
Responding to the findings, a Trump spokesperson argued that “Considering that we’re witnessing the single biggest coordinated media attack in political history, it should come as no surprise. If the [Federal Election Commission] viewed their biased hit pieces against Mr. Trump as in-kind contributions, they would have exceeded their maximum allowable gift limits a long time ago.”
According to the Washington Post media blog, that journalist donations in news organizations that allows it (and many don’t) favor Clinton in a big way is understandable because Trump — the former Celebrity Apprentice host on NBC and someone who otherwise spent a lot time in the media orbit — is allegedly hostile the First Amendment.
Election is being rigged by the media, in a coordinated effort with the Clinton campaign, by putting stories that never happened into news!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 16, 2016
Against this backdrop, recall that heading into the first debate, a Rasmussen poll indicated that almost 50 percent of American voters thought that the presidential debate moderators would help Hillary Clinton , while hardly anyone expected that Trump would be extended the same courtesy.
The media has been giving 24/7 coverage to the Access Hollywood “locked-room talk” followed by allegations of groping against Trump, but has devoted far less airtime to the ongoing WikiLeaks revelations, including hacked emails from Clinton campaign manager John Podesta.
According to Andrew Malcom of the McClatchy News Service, Trump’s personal misadventures have drawn the spotlight away from Clinton policy issues (which included a speech to a Brazilian bank in which she advocated for open trade and open borders ).
“All this continued to submerge Clinton’s own scandalous troubles. Using hacked emails from an unidentified source, WikiLeaks released thousands of Clinton campaign emails. They revealed disdain for Catholics, secret links with journalists, collusion with the family foundation and against other Democrats, duplicitous political positions, campaign infighting and devastating evaluations of Clinton’s talents by her own campaign chief…Let’s see, which story do you think would draw maximum interest…”
Journalist donations: $382,000 to #HillaryClinton ; $14,000 to #DonaldTrump . https://t.co/KOqBhQPkd7 #tcot
— IBDeditorials (@IBDeditorials) October 17, 2016
According to Joe Concha of The Hill , the ratio of Trump negative coverage to Clinton on the ABC, NBC, and CBS nightly news programs last Thursday night alone was 23 to 1 .
. @tuckercarlson : “Here’s a breakdown [of coverage] for the three major networks.” pic.twitter.com/9wY725Tipa
— Fox News (@FoxNews) October 14, 2016
Last week, FNC host Bill O’Reilly claimed that at least three media organizations are out to destroy Donald Trump.
Whether you like Trump or hate him, and regardless of the reasons, personal or professional, his American First nationalism seems to have galvanized opposition to him in both political parties and various media outlets/corporate interests among those who are generally seen as in the globalism camp.
“There’s nothing particularly wrong journalists pushing an ideological viewpoint, so long as they make it clear to readers and viewers what they are doing. The problem is that the mainstream press keeps pretending to be nonpartisan when they are, in fact, little more than a PR shop for Democrats. In business, this is called false advertising, and it happens to be illegal,” an Investor’s Business Daily editorial opined about the Center for Public Integrity report.
Do you think that that the Clinton-Trump donation imbalance according to the CPI data speaks to larger issues in the media?
[Featured Image by John Locher/AP Images]
Added: James O’Keefe of Project Veritas claims that the media corporations are blacklisting his story about Hillary Clinton-affiliated operatives allegedly inciting violence at Trump rallies.
Hey @andersoncooper , have you seen my bombshell on #DNC & @HillaryClinton inciting violence at @realDonaldTrump rallies? #BirdDogging @CNN pic.twitter.com/WILgyiQEQk
— James O’Keefe (@JamesOKeefeIII) October 17, 2016