Has The Times Dismissed Bernie Sanders?

Dear Friends,

As I wrote a couple of days ago, The New York Times seems to have decided that it will not provide fair coverage to Bernie Sanders.  About that same time Margaret Sullivan the Public Editor for The Times, wrote a column entitled: "Has The Times Dismissed Bernie Sanders?" (here).  It was good that she took the complaints seriously enough to write the column, but in my view her response was rather dismissive in itself.  Here is one of her first paragraphs.

It’s not hard to understand the news judgment at play here: Given Hillary Rodham Clinton as such a dominant candidate, with widespread support, lots of money and the Democratic Party’s likely imprimatur, almost any other Democratic candidate looked like an also-ran. And Mr. Sanders — whose politics are significantly left of center and who is 74 years old — didn’t appear to be the kind of candidate to change that view.

What I hear her saying is that The Times will cover the person with money, establishment support and centrist views who will not upset the status quo with which The Times is very happy.

Ms. Sullivan goes on to provide the numbers which speak for themselves, but she interprets the lopsided coverage of Hillary Clinton by saying that The Times did not ignore Mr. Sanders and that some of the coverage of Hillary was not favorable.  The fact that Senator Sanders is not burdened by a huge email scandal hardly justifies not giving him coverage.

How does this compare with the coverage of some of the other candidates, particularly Mrs. Clinton? Looking at August alone, The Times ran 14 articles on Mr. Sanders, compared with 54 on Mrs. Clinton. Donald Trump – like Mr. Sanders, also considered by many an extreme long shot for his party’s nomination – got the most coverage last month: 63 articles. Other Republican candidates received far less ink than Trump: Jeb Bush was the subject of 18 articles in August, and Marco Rubio, 10. (Of course, not all press is good press for any of the candidates. In Mrs. Clinton’s case, for example, many of the August articles dealt with her questionable email practices as secretary of state.)

So, in terms of numbers alone, The Times certainly has not ignored Mr. Sanders. The Times did get off to a very slow start with its Sanders coverage but has responded as the crowds at his events have grown.

What Ms. Sullivan wrote was technically correct.  The Times has not ignored Bernie Sanders.  They simply gave Hillary Clinton almost 4 times the coverage when measured in stories about them.  Ms. Sullivan also pointed out the obvious that Donald Trump who we can only hope is not a serious candidate got the most coverage.  Ms. Sullivan makes no attempt to justify that fact on journalistic or any other grounds.  It is in fact something about which I hope she is embarrassed.

In a separate column, Ms. Sullivan published an email from The Times Senior Editor, Carolyn Ryan, responding to criticisms of the coverage or lack thereof of Bernie Sanders (here).  Ms. Ryan also uses the numbers to indicate that they have not ignored Bernie Sanders but fails to justify the huge difference in coverage.  In my view, her response is more defensive than enlightening.  Of course, the fact is the criticism that The Times is not providing fair coverage to Bernie Sanders is valid so it is impossible to defend The Times' coverage.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal