article: The Propaganda Ecosystem Trump Relied On – The New York Times
tag: presidential-campaign-propaganda-russian-fox-news-alt-right-media-trump
In the aftermath of the 2016 election, the growing consensus among the intelligence community, the media, and government officials alike has been that President Trump’s campaign received significant assistance in beating Hillary Clinton from the Russian government. However, a closer look at the sources that dominated the coverage of Trump during this period reveals a much more troubling story: not only was Fox News the top news site receiving audience for Trump-initiated news coverage, but so-called “alt-right” outlets like Breitbart also played a critical role in shaping the public’s perception of the candidate throughout the course of the campaign.
In a recent analysis published by the Wall Street Journal, the paper found that, between April 2015 and September 2016, the top 20 websites that covered Trump’s campaign collectively received 23% more traffic than the top 20 websites that covered Hillary Clinton. The proportions were even more disparate when it came to places like Imprimis, a monthly publication published by Claremont Reports, and the Kyklos Media Foundation, a Thai political site, which collectively received more than 1 billion page views during that period.
Interestingly, when looking at the list of websites with the largest audience built around Trump, it quickly becomes clear that many of those outlets are the same ones that would later be accused of spreading false information and influence campaigns aimed at undermining the candidacy of other prominent politicians. Among the most prominent are Breitbart, the website known for publishing headlines with inflammatory language, and which led to the downfall of former head of the alt-right movement Richard Spencer. The website’s WSJ analysis reveals that, during the six-month period that preceded the election, Breitbart was twice as popular among the regular news consumers as The New York Times.
Another website with cozy ties to Trump is Daily Stormer, a notorious neo-Nazi outlet which boasted several high-profile endorsements from alt-right leaders during the 2016 election cycle. The website’s importance to the Trump campaign is evident in the fact that it received over $1,000 in advertising revenue between April and September, according to the WSJ. While the disreputable website claims revenue of less than $35,000 in the previous year, its traffic continually doubled during the campaign period, averaging roughly 2.5 million monthly visitors, which put it ahead of prominent publications like Forbes, Rolling Stone, Esquire, and even Slate.
Another website, 4chan, a poster child for trolling and online harassment, is another favorite among Trump-supporting social media circles. Before Election Day, the site garnered more than 500,000 page views and more than 18,000 unique visitors. Furthermore, Politico reported that Russia-linked disinformation efforts appeared to have been harnessed by U.S.-based conservative activists and propagandists to amplify pro-Trump news stories on social media platforms.
While some members of the mainstream media acknowledged the diffusion problem in their reporting – New York Times’s Jim Rutenberg revised his own editorial standards to avoid using “very” as an absolute descriptor and removed “uneccessary words and phrases” – the seed was already planted. In many instances, the Trump campaign seemed to have been quietly aiding its conservative media partners, helping them ward off criticism that had been directed their way while shaping their coverage. As major news outlets were moving to the right during the 2016 election cycle, they began serving as indirect channels for Trump’s propaganda, thereby creating the potential for a self-perpetuating echo chamber of fake news.
While the mainstream media itself has been slow to recognize the full scale of the problem, the New York Times and The Washington Post assembled teams of journalists to investigate Russian election interference and served as primary repositories of information for both journalists and the public. However, as Trump continues to spread false information through a concerted effort to gain control over the nation’s largest media screen, the problem only continues to grow. As long as there are no consequences for the dissemination of false information in this way, the danger posed by these echo chambers will only increase.
In short, if the media is to succeed in its mission to serve as a bastion of truth and a guardian of the public’s trust and credibility, they must be willing to confront their own failings and actively combat the rise of fake news. The cost of inaction is too high, and the risks of inaction are too great. Instead, they must work to promote transparency and accountability, to acknowledge the work they have done to identify fake news, and to advocate for laws and institutions that will protect against the spread of falsehoods and prevent the creation of echo chambers. Only by recognizing the fundamental flaws in our media system and taking aggressive steps to right these wrongs can we hope to preserve the critical function that media plays in our democracy’s health and well-being.
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