Numbers: Our Data Library

The dominant frame in the press coverage of the presidential debates of 2004 was on the impact of the debates on the horse race. , followed by a straight forward account of what the candidates said.

Different online news sites approached covering the debates of 2004 differently, but of the major ones, only MSNBC had a significant number of original bylined stories.

The tone of all media stories both about Gore and those focused more on Bush tended to be negative in 2000, but Gore’s coverage was more so. Bush stories were also nearly twice as likely to be positive as were those about Gore.

The tone of the press coverage of the debates in 2004 was highly negative for Presidential Bush. Nearly 60% of the stories were critical of the President, more than twice the percentage for challenger John Kerry.

On network television, the tone of the debate coverage in 2004 was even more positive for John Kerry than in the media overall. Nearly six in ten stories were positive about Kerry, compared with less than two in ten for Bush. 

Nearly seven out of ten newspaper stories about Bush’s debate performance were negative, compared with three out of ten about Kerry. This was similar to what people saw on television. 

Roughly eight out of ten news stories about the presidential candidates during the primaries in 2000 focused on things that affected politicians rather than citizens.

The insider horse race focus of the debate coverage in 2004 is evident in who the stories talked about being impacted. Only about a quarter of newspaper stories focused on things that would directly affect citizens in the debates, such as policy positions.

Most of the newspaper stories of the presidential debates focused on both candidates.