By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
In what may be one of the biggest non-surprises of the campaign season, a national survey by a top polling firm which shows 57 percent of likely voters believe the media has been giving Vice President Kamala Harris the best treatment while only 29 percent think former President Donald Trump is being favored.
The poll was conducted by Rasmussen Reports, which said Friday that a national telephone and online survey found 60 percent of likely voters believe most reporters try to help the candidate they want to win. That’s up from 51 percent who felt that way during the 2020 presidential campaign.
Twenty-eight percent of respondents disagree, saying they believe most reporters try to offer unbiased coverage, while 12 percent are not sure.
It’s an embarrassing number which the establishment media probably won’t shake between now and November. Harris is riding high with a big bump in popularity since replacing Joe Biden on the Democratic ticket. It all becomes official next week during the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Biden bowed out of the race when high-ranking Democrats, including former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, allegedly encouraged him to step aside following his disastrous performance during a Juen debate with Trump on CNN.
According to Rasmussen, the survey of 1,158 likely voters was conducted Aug. 12-14, and it has a margin of sampling error of +/- 3 percentage points.
The survey revealed that 44 percent of Democrats think most reporters try to provide balanced campaign coverage, only 16 percent of Republicans and 23 percent of Independents agree. A whopping 74 percent of Republicans, 45 percent of Democrats and 64 percent of Independents “think most reporters try to help the candidate they want to win.”
“Majorities of every political category – 65% of Republicans, 53% of Democrats and 54% of unaffiliated voters – say Harris has received the best treatment from the media so far,” Rasmussen said. “Looking ahead at the campaign, 66% of Republicans, 34% of Democrats and 50% of unaffiliated voters expect most reporters to try to help Harris. Thirty-eight percent (38%) of Democrats say most reporters will offer unbiased coverage instead, but only 14% of Republicans and 26% of unaffiliated voters agree.”
By gender, 64 percent of men and 52 percent of women in the poll think Harris has received the best media treatment, “and men are also more likely to expect that most reporters will try to help Harris going forward in the campaign,” Rasmussen added.
More than twice the number of Democrats (38 percent) than Republicans (14 percent) think most reporters will offer “unbiased coverage” of the campaign, while 26 percent of Independents expect the press to remain unbiased.
