In 2020 and 2024 respectively, GOP President Donald Trump and Democratic President Joe Biden each faced three longshot primary challengers, but the media coverage of these campaigns was vastly different, a NewsBusters study has found.
Analysts analyzed all programming on ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, CNN, and MSNBC of Trump challengers from April 15, 2019 to March 18, 2020, and of Biden challengers from March 4, 2023 to March 6, 2024, and found that the Republican challengers of former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld, former Illinois Rep. Joe Walsh, and former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford got 115 interviews during the campaign. By contrast, the Democratic challengers of 2020 candidate and self-help author Marianne Williamson, environmental lawyer and anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips received only 25.
During the 2020…
