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WATCHING HISTORY: TV COVERAGE OFTHE 2008 CAMPAIGNDebora Halpern Wenger & Susan A. MacManusPublished online: 08 May 2009.

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WATCHING HISTORY: TV COVERAGE OF

THE 2008 CAMPAIGN

Debora Halpern Wenger and Susan A. MacManus

It was an election ‘‘season’’ like no other. Intense citizen interest, ground-breaking

candidates and a series of critical issues facing the nation created an opportunity for TV

newsrooms*they were able to devote time and resources to political coverage knowing

that viewers would actually watch. TV was the medium of choice. Sixty-eight percent of

voters got most of their presidential campaign news from TV (Pew Research Center,

2008c).

Both national networks and local stations expanded their programming to capitalize

on presidential election fever. Sunday morning news magazine shows flourished (Morales,

2008). Cable networks added political shows and featured new stars as hosts

(feministing.com, 2008). Local stations created their own news magazine shows; their

anchors and political reporters moderated local political debates and/or participated in

local political forums.

Voters Watch Early and Often

Throughout what was to become the nation’s first two-year election campaign,

audience interest never waned. Debates began in 2007 (Zaidi, 2007) as a record-breaking

number of Democratic (eight) and Republican (11) candidates sought the nomination of

their respective parties. The extended Democratic nomination fight between Barack

Obama and Hillary Clinton yielded many more nationally-covered candidate debates

during the nomination stage than in the past. These debates were widely covered in news

broadcasts. More importantly, a sizable portion of the voters in states where they were

held identified the debates as critical factors in helping them decide which candidate to

support.1

When big battleground states like Florida and Michigan thumbed their noses at

party rules and held their primaries early, their fight to have their delegates seated at the

national conventions was actually televised. The late May two-day meeting of the National

Democratic Party Rules and Bylaws Committee seeking to resolve the issue was broadcast

on some cable outlets and led the news cycle for several days.

The closeness of the Obama�Clinton battle elevated the importance of a group of

people most citizens had no knowledge of*the 852 super delegates. The almost daily

reporting on the number of super delegates supporting each candidate added another

level of drama to the nomination fight. The public’s unfamiliarity with the whole concept

of super delegates allowed television to play an instructional role. In certain instances,

local television coverage of super delegates from the area even prompted delegates to

reverse their initial pledges (e.g., African American Congress members who had initially

endorsed Clinton over Obama).

The extremely competitive race between Obama and Clinton meant that states with

primaries or caucuses scheduled late into the nominating process (April, May, and June)

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actually mattered for a change. Candidate visits and television ads saturated the airwaves,

even in the smallest of states.

Record Number of Viewers for Conventions and Post-Convention Debates

Prior to the primaries and caucuses, television experts were contemplating scaling

back coverage of national political conventions, referring to them as nothing more than

official ‘‘coronation’’ galas (Tumulty, 2008). Nothing turned out to be further from the

truth.

Americans ended up watching both conventions in record numbers. An analysis by

Nielsen found that ‘‘nearly two thirds of all U.S. households (64.5% or 73.2 million homes)

tuned in to at least one of the 2008 political conventions’’ (Malcolm, 2008). Obama’s

acceptance speech from Denver’s Invesco Stadium, before more than 80,000 supporters

on the 45th anniversary of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘‘I Have a Dream’’ speech, drew

a television audience of over 38 million. John McCain’s acceptance speech a week later

drew over 40 million. And Palin’s vice presidential nomination acceptance speech drew the

largest viewing audience for a running mate’s speech in history (over 37 million). The

conventions combined turned out to be ‘‘the first smash hit of the new television season’’

(Rutenberg and Stelter, 2008). About half of all households watched each convention; 34

percent watched both (Silva, 2008).

The debates sponsored by the Presidential Commission on Debates also drew large

viewing audiences. Eighty percent of Americans watched at least some television debate

coverage (Pew Research Center, 2008b). The first presidential debate at the end of

September drew 52.4 million viewers, the second, 63.2 million, and the third, 56.5 million

(Nielsen Wire, 2008). The vice presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin

attracted some 70 million viewers, outdrawing the three presidential debates. It ended up

being the second-most-watched debate of all time.

Considerable media coverage focused on controversies over the objectivity of the

debate moderators (Jim Lehrer, Gwen Ifill, Tom Brokaw, and Bob Schieffer), their networks,

and the stable of pundits used to ‘‘score’’ the debates. Later analyses revealed a significant

disconnect between television pundits’ scoring of the debates and citizens’ assessments

(Pew Research Center, 2008b).

Media Bias and Ideological Segmentation

Claims of media bias*particularly on cable and broadcast networks*and the

impact of non-traditional media kept TV news organizations feeling the pressure to

continually defend their coverage from competitors and criticism.

Over the course of the campaign, attitudes against the mainstream national media

hardened. A Pew survey found that 70 percent believed the national media was trying to

throw the election toward their favorite candidate. A stunning third believed it was more

effective for a candidate to have a reporter on their side than to have campaign funds

(Pew Research Center, 2008b). The disparate treatment of Obama and McCain led one

well-respected journalist to describe coverage as ‘‘the most disgusting failure of people in

our business since the Iraq war. It was extreme bias, extreme pro-Obama coverage’’ (Burns,

2008).

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However, The Pew Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism found that, overall,

media coverage of the presidential race wasn’t so much pro-Obama as it was anti-McCain.

Project for Excellence in Journalism released its study, ‘‘Winning the Media Campaign,’’ in

late October 2008.

For Obama during this period, just over a third of the stories were clearly positive in tone

(36%), while a similar number (35%) were neutral or mixed. A smaller number (29%) were

negative. For McCain, by comparison, nearly six in ten of the stories studied were

decidedly negative in nature (57%), while fewer than two in ten (14%) were positive.

(Project for Excellence in Journalism, 2008a)

In another study, released just days before the general election, Project for

Excellence in Journalism confirmed what the public and the campaigns had already

concluded, namely that cable TV news is divided along ideological lines. During the early

primary season, they had witnessed Democratic candidates refusing to participate in a

debate to be held on the Fox News Channel even though the debate was co-sponsored by

the Congressional Black Caucus (Felling, 2007) and Republicans refusing to participate in a

‘‘YouTube’’ co-sponsored debate on CNN (Modine, 2007). The Pew research found MSNBC

and Fox News Channel to be diametrically opposed to each other politically, with the

former seeming to support Obama and the latter McCain. CNN, however, appeared to be

less partisan, but more negative overall than other media outlets. The study also found the

nightly network newscasts to be more neutral and less negative than the media as a whole

(Project For Excellence in Journalism, 2008b), although later studies confirmed that

viewership of those programs had slipped from 2004 levels (Morales, 2008).

Post-election surveys tapping citizen opinions about media coverage of the 2008

election found a divided electorate: 46 percent felt the press had too much influence on

the election outcome; 48 percent said it had the right amount. ‘‘An overwhelming

percentage of Democrats (83%) think the press was fair toward Obama’s campaign,

compared with just 22% of Republicans who say the press was fair to McCain’’ (Pew

Research Center, 2008c).

Television Websites Key Sources of Campaign News, Less so for Ads

Over half of all voters (56 percent) accessed campaign news from the Internet*up

from 41 percent in 2004. Three of the top five websites for campaign news were television

network sites: CNN (first), MSNBC/NBC (third), and Fox (fifth). These networks aggressively

promoted their websites as ‘‘the place to go’’ to get more in-depth information via

archived stories, videos, and links to other key political websites. Not surprisingly, Obama

supporters went more frequently to CNN’s website; McCain supporters to Fox (Pew

Research Center, 2008c).

Somewhat unexpected was the low level of online political advertising by the

candidates, political parties, and independent groups. Online advertising in the 2008

campaign totaled less than 1 percent of what was spent on television and was not as

effective. (Online ads were utilized by both the Obama and McCain campaigns, but more

by Obama. From January to August 2008, Obama spent around $5.5 million on online ads;

Kaye, 2008). ‘‘In the political sphere, television is [still] viewed as the ultimate persuasion

medium and the Web more akin to direct mail’’ (Kaye, 2008). That was good news to an

industry that really needed an infusion of cash.

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Broadcast News Anchors, Political Analysts, and Cable Political ShowHosts: Stars in Their Own Right

Americans love their news celebrities. The sudden death on June 13, 2008 of NBC

News’ Tim Russert, NBC’s Washington bureau chief and moderator of Meet the Press,

television’s most highly rated Sunday morning show, stunned the public and the media

world. The importance of Meet the Press to the network’s political brand convinced Tom

Brokaw, the popular former NBC Nightly News anchor to temporarily come out of

retirement to host the show until after the election (Bodman, 2008).

The candidacies of Obama, Clinton, and later Palin forced television executives to

pay attention to diversity in the ranks of anchors, political show hosts, and guests. In 2008,

the number of females anchoring/hosting evening political news shows either on

broadcast (Katie Couric*CBS), public television (Gwen Ifill*PBS), or cable news networks

(Campbell Brown*CNN, Greta Van Susteren*Fox, Rachel Maddow*MSNBC) increased

slightly, but was still rather small. Nonetheless, these women gave much needed female

voices to political news shows. In addition, ‘‘The presence of women

candidates . . . pushed media executives to showcase more women experts on the cable

shows as guests’’ (feministing.com, 2008).

Katie Couric, anchor of the CBS Evening News, ultimately had the greatest influence,

particularly on women’s opinions and voting behavior (MacManus, forthcoming). Her

interview of Sarah Palin was in many minds, a key factor in shifting some women voters

away from the McCain�Palin ticket. It was Palin’s first high-profile interview and she didn’t

do all that well. What happened after the interview is exemplary of how regular news

coverage is greatly enhanced by other media. The interview, spread out over two evenings

on CBS, was subsequently played (or some spoof of it) on CNN, YouTube, Saturday Night

Live, and thousands of blogs. Cumulatively across these venues, millions more got a

glimpse of Palin’s performance than those watching the CBS Evening News (Carter, 2008).

TV Pop Show Personalities Draw in Younger Viewers, Affect ElectionOutcome

While Comedy Central’s The Daily Show (with Jon Stewart) and The (Stephen) Colbert

Report remained favorite sources of campaign ‘‘news’’ for the younger generation as they

had been in 2004, it was the women who drew record numbers of viewers in 2008,

specifically Oprah, Tina Fey, and ladies on The View (MacManus, 2010).

For years, people have joked that TV talk show host Oprah Winfrey would be

unstoppable as a presidential candidate herself and that any endorsement by her would

virtually guarantee success for the lucky candidate. But Oprah had always refused to make

political endorsements. That changed in 2008, when she broke with tradition and

endorsed Obama on Larry King Live. By all accounts, the endorsement had a major impact

on Obama’s successes on his way to the top:

The most decisive moment in Hollywood’s attempt to influence the election was Oprah

Winfrey’s introduction of Barack Obama on her daytime television show. This simply had

never happened before . . . But Oprah not only introduced Obama, she vouched for him,

she gave him what Joan Crawford once called ‘‘the big okay,’’ her seal of approval.

Almost instantly, Winfrey transformed Obama from an ambitious young politician into a

cultural star. (Katz, 2008)

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Tina Fey was so wildly popular for her impersonations of Sarah Palin on Saturday

Night Live that the vice presidential nominee felt compelled to appear alongside Fey on

the program. The result was the largest audience to watch Saturday Night Live in years.

Many believe that Tina Fey greatly harmed Palin, particularly among women voters who

initially leaned her way, by defining her in a highly unflattering way, ‘‘sending Palin from

her starring role at the Republican convention, crashing down to her later image as

someone grasping for respect’’ (Katz, 2008).

Record audiences also tuned in to ABC’s popular daytime television program, The

View, featuring five female co-hosts*four liberals (Walters, Goldberg, Sheppard, Behar)

and one lonely conservative (Hasselbeck)*routinely discussing politics and hosting the

candidates and their spouses. A program designed to be argumentative, provocative, and

controversial, it was no surprise that the program led all networks in reaching women 18�49 years of age in the coveted Daytime slot during the fall 2008 sweeps (Ibarra, 2008).

Campaigns’ Manipulation of the Media

The 2008 election clearly demonstrated the media savvy of the presidential

campaigns. Their media consultants were masters in getting free media coverage. They

routinely used television news to their advantage, leaking stories at key moments when

coverage of their candidate was slim. Another common strategy was to release new ads

and videos on candidate websites and/or YouTube, then dare reporters not to cover them.

But the most dramatic use of the media by far was the Obama campaign’s premier

‘‘teaser’’*the announcement days in advance that he would reveal his vice presidential

running mate choice via text message. This decision dominated the news for days, hours,

and minutes right up to the revelation. The McCain campaign’s most dramatic use of the

media came with the release of the infamous ‘‘Celebrity’’ ad likening Obama’s popularity

(and political inexperience) to that of Hollywood divas Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. It

was a risky move designed to spark more media coverage of the McCain campaign at a

time when it was flailing and funds were short. It worked in the short term (Jurkowitz,

2008). Said one analyst: ‘‘It was a fine buy because free media saw and heard about it’’

then jumped on it ‘‘because nothing [was] going on at [that] point in the campaign’’

(Pappu, 2008).

Local News a Winner for Candidates and Citizens Alike

Though the audience for cable news is growing, the dominant news medium

continues to be local television with 51 percent of people saying they view some local

news daily (Morales, 2008). In previous election years, local TV outlets have been criticized

for their lack of coverage on local political races, but in 2008 that criticism was relatively

muted.

One reason may be that local political coverage was more plentiful. For example,

Belo Corporation owns 15 news-producing television stations in some of the country’s

largest TV markets. Following the election, the company put out a news release with a

recap of its efforts, including more than 210 hours of political coverage and more than 14

hours of free airtime to 140 congressional and gubernatorial candidates. Since the

initiative began in 1996, several news companies have agreed to allow candidates up to

five minutes of free airtime in which to communicate their messages without being heavily

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edited into short sound bites. Scripps-Howard and Granite Broadcasting were among

those companies that also provided free airtime to candidates in 2008 (Bachman, 2008;

E. W. Scripps Company, 2008).

Another reason for more local coverage was the realization that people trust local

news media more than the national news media (Newport, 2007; Pew Research Center,

2008a). This fact helps explain why the presidential candidates often preferred to be

interviewed by local anchors and reporters, especially in key battleground states as the

campaign came to a close. The local stations gladly accommodated.

A Glitzy Election Night with Record Audiences

Armed with the knowledge that interest in the presidential election was extremely

high, the network and cable news organizations pulled out all the stops on Election Night.

From the famous CNN ‘‘hologram’’ to MSNBC’s 3-D bar graphs, technology made waiting

for election results a spectacle to behold.

Though purists will tell you that it wasn’t really a hologram at all, CNN’s new take on

the old-fashioned split screen had correspondents and interview subjects in remote

locations appear to materialize in CNN’s election headquarters. NBC once again used

the ice-skating rink at Rockefeller Center as its electoral map, and MSNBC’s virtual set had

the aforementioned bar graphs and giant maps, which changed in real-time before the

viewers’ eyes (Moore, 2008).

And people were watching. According to Nielsen, nearly 71.5 million people tuned

in to election coverage from 8 to 11 p.m. on November 4. That was a major increase from

both 2004 ‘‘when 59.2 million people watched George Bush defeat John Kerry, and from

2000, when 61.6 million people watched the (inconclusive) election results pour in’’

(Weprin, 2008). It’s also interesting to note that CNN, the least biased cable news outlet

according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism, had significantly more viewers (12.3

million) than either Fox News (9 million) or MSNBC (5.9 million).

On the local level, many news outlets saw increased audience as well. For example,

Hearst-Argyle announced in a news release that more than 1.5 million people had viewed

its stations’ late newscasts, and another 1.5 million had accessed its Election Day coverage

online (Hearst-Argyle Television, Inc., 2008).

Looking Ahead to 2012

So, despite record high viewership for election coverage in 2008, it’s clear that

television news outlets have several issues to address before 2012. The ability for

campaigns to bypass the mainstream media with their messages is likely to continue to

eat into the revenue typically generated by TV ads in an election year, and that in turn is

likely to affect the amount of election coverage networks and individual stations can

afford to produce.

With no indication that the economic woes forcing current newsroom cutbacks will

abate anytime soon, that raises the question of how television news operations will find

the resources to conduct adequate fact checks of candidate rhetoric or investigate

candidate backgrounds and platforms.

The bias issue may continue to dog the networks, in particular, and may send more

audience to non-traditional media outlets for their election news. Already younger viewers

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head to the Web first for national news and that trend is expected to grow Pew Research

Center (2008d).

Though it is highly likely that television will continue to play a major role in

campaign coverage in 2012, we may look back at 2008 as a watershed year in TV election

coverage*a defining moment for the role of broadcast journalism within the political

process.

NOTE

1. Exit poll data for Ohio Democrats, 73% of respondents answered yes to: ‘‘Were Debates

Important to Your Vote?’’, http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls.main/.

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Debora Wenger, University of Mississippi, 227 Farley Hall, MS 38677, USA. E-mail:

drwenger@olemiss.edu

Susan A. MacManus, University of South Florida, Government and International Affairs,

4202 E Fowler Ave, SOC107, Tampa, FL 33620, USA. E-mail: macmanus@cas.usf.edu

ONLINE NEWS LEADS PRESIDENTIAL

CAMPAIGN NEWS CYCLE

Josh Kraushaar

The year 2008 marked the first presidential election year when upstart Internet

publications upstaged their print counterparts, and became a crucial cog in how voters

get their political news. It also altered how the leading presidential campaigns

disseminated their message.

The warp speed of the non-stop news cycle forced campaigns to deal with the press

differently than in past elections, and the demand for instantaneous news spurred the

popularity of online news publications, blogs and the necessity of frequent online updates

on the Web.

I speak from experience. Since February 2007, I’ve been a political correspondent for

Politico*a ‘‘new media’’ publication that made its mark by its ability to report quickly on

every angle of the campaign trail while also providing a sharper, analytical voice than

traditional news outlets.

Politico was one of many online publications that drove the conversation this

election year. The Huffington Post became a clearinghouse for liberal commentary and

quickly became one of the most popular online destinations. RealClearPolitics saw its

aggregation of polls cited by the major news networks, and became a staple of political

coverage.

Their emergence on the scene prompted traditional media outlets to adapt on the

fly. The New York Times added ‘‘The Caucus’’ blog to supplement its news coverage. The

Washington Post relied on its popular ‘‘The Fix’’ blog, authored by Chris Cillizza to provide

analysis on the campaign trail. And the original online purveyor of news and gossip, the

Drudge Report, saw its popularity soar during the campaign.

I only played a small, modest role in this brave new world of online political

journalism during the presidential campaign*but my experiences help illustrate how the

Internet has changed the pace and process of the news media in such a short period of

time.

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