Republicans have two distinct media advantages as November approaches: a propaganda machine on the right that creates and amplifies disinformation and a presidential candidate so flawed and broken that his outrageous behavior barely registers among corporate media anymore.
Matt Gertz, senior fellow at Media Matters for America, illustrated how the media environment benefits Donald Trump by pointing to his remarks earlier this month that his administration would “root out” his political opponents that “live like vermin within the confines of our country.”
Gertz contrasted this month’s coverage of Trump’s Nazi-esque language against the wall-to-wall coverage in 2016 of then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton referring to Trump’s “basket of deplorables.” In the first week following Clinton’s gaffe, network news outlets spent 54 minutes on her comments. Meanwhile, they only devoted three minutes to Trump’s “vermin” comments. The disparity on cable news was far worse, with 1,662 mentions of “deplorables” throughout the first week versus 191 mentions of “vermin.”
Trump has lowered the bar so far that the relentless amount of garbage he spews barely causes a blip in corporate media coverage.
At the same time, the right-wing propaganda machine routinely fabricates and disseminates controversies to its audiences. Perhaps the most recent example was the easily debunked falsehood that the FBI sought to assassinate Trump when it searched his Mar-a-Lago residence for presidential records he had deliberately refused to return to the National Archives.
The bifurcated media treatment of Trump versus that of President Joe Biden incontrovertibly benefits Republicans this election cycle, as journalist Greg Sargent pointed out on The Daily Blast.
The antidote to that inherent media bias, at least in the short term, is for average voters—the most effective messengers bar none—to embrace their power to influence people around them.
So what messages should anti-Trump, pro-democracy voters transmit in their spheres of influence? It depends on who you’re talking to.
If you’re talking to Trump voters who condemn the Jan. 6 insurrection but don’t really want to vote for Biden, The Bulwark crew took a shot at how to engage these voters in a recent episode of Crooked Media’s “The Wilderness.”
Former Republican strategist Tim Miller suggested playing on the fear that Trump will never leave office, which many swing voters are already expressing.
“What do you think the chances are that Trump doesn’t leave office after four years?” Then wait for the answer, Miller advised, as a way to start the conversation. If they say 5%, well, that 5% is too much of a risk. After all, Trump already orchestrated a coup to stay in office the last time he lost an election.
Generally speaking, Republicans who are open to voting for Biden don’t believe he stole the 2020 election and were horrified by the violent insurrection attempt, so revisiting that concern is a worthwhile endeavor.
However, if you’re talking to voters who are primarily worried about the economy and inflation, it might be better to phrase the question as “who do you think will fight for you?” Democrats are the ones cracking down on price-gouging corporations by capping bank fees and insulin prices, while Trump is promising corporations another $2 trillion tax cut.
Younger voters might be the most difficult to reach of all the potential swing voters. As Dan Pfeiffer, former Obama senior adviser on strategy and communications, wrote on Substack Tuesday, TikTok is hurting Biden, especially among young people who are the platform’s primary users. Trump’s right-wing influencers are outgunning progressive firebrands such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on a platform that is featuring political news even as other social media platforms de-emphasize it.
Polling suggests that Trump might be making gains with younger voters, but loss of freedoms and abortion access remain a top priority for young Democrats. Linking Biden to Democratic priorities like expanding protections of abortion, the LGBTQ+ community, and voting rights as well as cracking down on gun violence could give him a boost among young voters.
It’s worth engaging the young people in your lives, many of whom align with Democratic values but aren’t enthused about voting for Biden. After all, abortion, gun control, and LGBTQ+ rights resonate among young voters, and they’re all on the table this election cycle.
The main goal as a messenger is to engage fence-sitters by understanding their concerns and where they might be getting their information from, then find the most meaningful information to share with them about how Democrats’ views on that issue align with their own.
Or, conversely, point out how insanely scary a second Trump term would be.
Like many Republicans, Donald Trump has tried to sidestep the issue of abortion and reproductive rights. But he stumbled during an interview with a CBS affiliate in Pittsburgh this week, promising an “interesting” new policy that would let states restrict contraception..
