Trump Collecting Ammo on Media ‘Bias’

Related: FCC: Rules are Made to Be Kept

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and the Republican party have taken his attack on the media to a whole new level.

Last week, the Trump Make America Great Again Committee, which comprises Trump’s presidential campaign committee and the Republican National Committee, sent out an email alert to supporters proclaiming: “We’re not just fighting against Hillary Clinton.…We are running against the very dishonest and totally biased media!” while attempting to collect data to add fuel to the attack.

The email said Trump was looking for his own poll to offer up in media interviews to back up his claims of bias.

The survey targeted cable news outlets—CNN, MSNBC, Fox—with individual questions, but not the network news operations or local news outlets.

“It’s time to hold the media accountable for trying to rig this election against us,” the email said over Trump’s signature, asking that those supporters take a “Mainstream Accountability Survey.”

“All too often I’m asked about a ‘poll’ put out by a liberal organization that says the American people disagree with our commonsense reforms to fix our country. Well, with your help today, the next time I’m being interviewed, I will have my own poll that shows that the American people disagree with the dishonest media!”

Among the—in some cases leading—questions the Republicans want “yes” or “no” answers on include:

1. “Hillary Clinton still gets a free pass from the media as she continues to lie about sending classified information on her secret server.”
2. “The mainstream media needs to do more to expose the shady donations to the Clinton Foundation.”
3. “The RNC was right to drop CNBC as a partner after they failed to fairly moderate the October debate.”
4. “More time is spent covering fake ‘scandals’ involving Trump than real scandals involving Hillary and our national security.”
5. “The media purposely tries to divide Republicans against each other in order to help elect Democrats.”
6. “The media uses slurs rather than facts to attack conservative stances on issues like border control, religious liberties and ObamaCare.”

The survey launch followed a barrage of anti-media tweets from Trump after the embattled candidate took heat for comments about President Obama being cofounder of ISIS and gun rights activists maybe being able to do something to stop Clinton.

You can read the entire survey at broadcastingcable.com/Aug22.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.