RUTHFULLY YOURS

President Donald Trump had a rough ride with the media during his first term. Big media and smaller social media alike often treated Trump with open scorn, and peppered him with insulting epithets, calling him “fascist” or even “Hitler.” Is it better this time? Not much: A majority in the latest I&I/TIPP Poll say he’s still being treated the same or worse as back then.

There’s little doubt, even among those on the left, that Trump is deeply reviled by the mostly left-leaning media. His braggadocio, his aggressive leadership style, his creatively unorthodox policies, his personal fearlessness and his overall popularity have kept Trump a media target.

The national online I&I/TIPP Poll of 1,434 adults, taken Feb. 26-28, asked this simple question: “Compared to his first term, how is the press treating Donald Trump?” The possible responses included “Better,” “Worse,” “The same,” and “Not sure.”

A plurality, 40%, said Trump was being treated about the same as the last go-round, while 16% said things had gotten worse. A sizable 31% felt his treatment by the media was better this time, while 12% weren’t sure. The poll’s margin of error is +/-2.6 percentage points.

What’s most surprising, perhaps, is that those most likely to say Trump is being treated better this time are Republicans. Among GOP voters, 46% said he’s getting better treatment in his second term, versus just 15% saying it was worse and 33% the same.

Among Democrats, just 24% said Trump’s treatment was better, and 18% said it was worse. Another 46% said it was the same. For independents, the comparable responses were 25% better, 17% worse, and 39% the same.

Are Democratic voters having a reckoning with their consciences over the media’s mostly unfair treatment of Trump?

Perhaps. Left-leaning media figures have had to grapple with the apparent fact that Trump is widely popular, even among Democratic constituencies, for his activist presidency.

A Pew Research poll at the start of Trump’s first term in 2017 looked at how print, broadcast, cable and online media covered the first 60 days of all the recent presidents, from Trump back to Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton.

As Issues & Insights (then part of Investor’s Business Daily) wrote in 2017:

“Some 62% of the media coverage of Trump was negative, Pew found. For Obama it, was just 20%; for Bush, 28%; for Clinton, also 28%. In other words, the media from the get-go had decided Trump was a bad president — before any of his policies had a chance to take hold.”

Moreover, it’s mainly the big, mainstream media outlets where the outright disgust over Trump’s presidency is most prevalent. Many smaller outlets, indeed, feel they’re being treated with respect for the first time.

The reason? Trump is the first president to put online, independent media at the front of the line when it comes to covering his presidency. Even some who might not support Trump politically agree it has been beneficial for free speech.

“To the extent President Trump’s White House is newly affording access to reporters that haven’t had it in the past, and that may represent outlets that align with his views, that’s great. It’s a more-speech, more-transparent approach,” First Amendment attorney Alex Morey, a vice president at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), told Newsweek.

The big media are both angry and fearful of Trump, who confronts them regularly and loudly about their well-document left-leaning bias. And Trump’s aggressive criticisms have had an impact on public opinion.

Indeed, a February YouGov poll reported by The Hill “found that 67% of U.S. respondents said that they don’t have ‘very much’ or any trust that news outlets can state facts fairly, accurately and fully while covering Trump’s second term.”

The media, shockingly, all but admit this.

As a recent New York Times piece said, “Mr. Trump and his allies are aggressively attacking the players and machinery that power the left, taking a series of highly partisan official actions that, if successful, will threaten to hobble Democrats’ ability to compete in elections for years to come.”

In recent weeks, we’ve seen examples both of why the media are seen as hostile to the Trump administration, and why the public increasingly distrusts them.

Recently, the Associated Press quoted U.S. National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard as saying that Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin “are very good friends.”

But AP soon had to print a retraction after admitting “Gabbard was talking about Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi,” not Putin.

Then there was the case of the gossipy Daily Beast, whose “new revelations reveal how Trump reportedly offered a female congresswoman his bed, as long as she kept it a secret from his wife.”

Pretty salacious stuff, at least by implication. Until you read how the congresswoman in question, Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, responded:

I was very pregnant and at the time experiencing pre-eclampsia symptoms, but was not diagnosed. As soon as President Donald Trump boarded the plane, being the gentleman and good person that he is, said if I did not feel well, I could use the back room. He did this in a respectful way and in front of my husband, of which we thanked him. He also assured me that they had a medical team on board in case anything happened and they were aware of how pregnant I was.

Quite a different picture. It’s no surprise that most Americans see the media as treating Trump essentially the same as they did during his first term in office, or even worse. Other presidents, of course, have shrugged off such biased behavior by the media. But Trump is the first president in recent years to aggressively respond.

I&I/TIPP publishes timely, unique, and informative data each month on topics of public interest. TIPP’s reputation for polling excellence comes from being the most accurate pollster for the past six presidential elections.

Terry Jones is an editor of Issues & Insights. His four decades of journalism experience include serving as national issues editor, economics editor, and editorial page editor for Investor’s Business Daily.