A Tyndall Report study of nightly news programs on NBC, CBS and ABC shows that Trump, with his inflammatory rhetoric, dominates media coverage.
And though Democratic candidate Senator Bernie Sanders has polling numbers similar to Trump, the amount of airtime devoted to the GOP front-runner dwarfs the coverage of Sanders.
Eric Boehlert, of Media Matters for America, observed this week that, "the network newscasts are wildly overplaying Trump, who regularly attracts between 20-30% of primary voter support, while at the same time wildly underplaying Sanders, who regularly attracts between 20-30% of primary voter support."
ABC World News Tonight devoted 81 minutes this year to Trump's campaign and just about 20 seconds to Sanders' candidacy, a ratio of 81 to 1, Common Dreams reported.
Sanders' campaign claims the media ignores the senator from Vermont because he challenges the corporate-dominated political system in the United States. Sanders’ team has begun a petition calling on corporate-owned channels to "start covering Bernie."
