Fox News’ coverage of violent crime dropped 63% over the week leading up to midterm elections, compared with the week before voters cast their ballots. According to Media Matters.
According to the left-leaning watchdog, Rupert Murdoch’s network aired 71 segments on weekdays about violent crime as votes were cast and counted. This is down from 193 the previous week. While crime reports increased this week, with 74 reports through Wednesday (including killings at the University of Virginia and the University of Idaho) — MMA pointed out that the coverage was less focused on depicting high crime rates in Democratic-led urban areas.
This tally also shows a 50% decrease in the week following Labor Day, which is traditionally considered to be the beginning of fall campaign season.
“Fox was open in its strategy of using violent crime as a political cudgel against Democrats throughout the midterms,” Media Matters said Friday. “Driven in part by Fox host Tucker Carlson’s calls for Republicans to run on the issue, the network engaged in a monthslong campaign to tie Democrats and the Biden administration to violent crime, often by highlighting specific incidents in ‘Democratic cities’ and blaming progressive criminal justice reform for individual violent crimes.”
Notably, Carlson draws a larger Democratic audience than most of Fox News’ other newscasts.
Representatives for Fox News did not comment to on the Media Matters’ report.
Media Matters’ data showed that on the weeks between Labor Day and the election, Fox News averaged 141 weekday violent crime stories. This number jumped to 187 and 193 segments during the week before Election Day. The data reflected the organization’s internal database of all original weekday programming on Fox News airing between 6 a.m. and midnight.
In the wake of the three fatal shootings, crime rates rose slightly this week University of Virginia football playersThe mysterious deaths of Four students at the University of Idaho, Media Matters said, “but the coverage was notably less focused on painting Democratic cities as crime-infested.”
“Fox’s breathless political coverage of violent crime during the midterm period often ignored key context, such as the reality that crime statistics from red states were higher than those of blue states and that Democrats across the country at multiple levels of government made efforts to fund law enforcement and curtail violent crime,”The watchdog said. “Instead, these segments often focused on attacking progressive district attorneys and candidates across the country.”
It said that the coverage dropped off was similar to the one after the 2018 midterms. During the weeks leading to the election, Fox News had a heavy focus on this topic. “migrant caravans”Heading to the U.S. Border
“The network went all in fearmongering about “migrant caravans” in the weeks leading up to the 2018 midterms,” Media Matters said, “only to completely drop the subject right after.”
