Fox News Bias

Bias in the Media - Fox v.s. CBS

Fox News, officially known as Fox News Channel, is an American cable news channel, that is owned by Fox Entertainment Group, a branch of 21st Century Fox. The channel broadcasts primarily from studios at 1211 Avenue of the Americas, New York City, New York. It was founded by Rupert Murdoch on October 7th, 1996, who hired former Republican Party media consultant Roger Ailes as its founding CEO. Growing during the late 1990s and 2000s, Fox News has become one of the most dominant cable news networks in the country. Although Fox News has been accused of biased reporting and promoting the Republican Party, its employees have denied the bias in their news reportings. And as of February 2015, approximately 94,700,000
American households receive the Fox News Channel, making it one of the most successful channels in the United States.
CBS, Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television network that is property of the CBS Corporation. CBS is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network", in reference to the company's iconic logo, in use since 1951. In 1928 William Paley bought and renamed Columbia Broadcasting System to United Independent Broadcasters Inc., which was a collection of 16 other radio stations. CBS became on of the largest radio networks in the States, and eventually one of the Big Three American Broadcast television networks. Although up till 1974, it was named United Independent Broadcasters Inc., but was eventually renamed to CBS Broadcasting Inc. in 1997, when it was bought by Westinghouse Electric Corporation. Today CBS has global revenues of $14B, owns-and-operates 16 stations and has affiliation agreements with 222 others. The Article “Nevada judge denies Trump campaign motion in polling place suit” from Fox News, talks about how Donald Trump was denied a lawsuit which he motioned for after the early voting polling stations in Nevada were kept open late.
It then goes on to state that Trump “asserted the later hours were granted in order to boost Democratic early-voting turnout.” While the article “Nevada judge denies Trump campaign lawsuit over early voting” from CBS, talks about how the polls were kept open longer, due to the fact that there was an extensive line of voters, who had been waiting before the polls closed, and the Nevada Registrar wanted to give everyone who had been in the line a chance to vote. Although it also talks about the fact that it had been identified that about 150-300 people had entered the voting line after 8 p.m., which is when the stations should have closed. And went on to state that it was not clear if the polls were kept open “open to accommodate voters who were already in line” or if they were “open ‘til 10 o’clock at night so a certain group could vote.” In the Fox article, there was no mention of the fact that the polls were kept open to ensure that voters already in line were able to cast a ballot, as had been stated in the CBS article. It only talked about the fact that the polls were kept open later than they should have been, and was done so to ensure more democrats could vote. It had quotes from Trump stating that even with those extra Democratic
votes he wouldn’t be “stopped on Tuesday”. Unlike the Fox article, the CBS article mentioned the fact that the reason the polls were kept open could not be proved, but went on to state stories from both sides. The fact that Nevada might have kept them open for people who had already been in line, and that people observed new voters getting into line even after the polls should have been closed. The CBS article gave both sides of the story, while the Fox article only seemed to present Trump’s side. The article “FBI reopens Clinton probe after new emails found in Anthony Weiner case” by Fox News, tends to blame Clinton for the email scandal, they go on to say that this investigation was long overdue, and that be it an accident or not Hillary should have to face the consequences of her mistake. It would seem as if they were just stating facts, not favoring or showing dislike towards Hillary, until the CBS article “FBI reviewing newly discovered Clinton-related emails” was read. This article goes on to protect Hillary, stating that the information in the emails was not proven to be significant. Going on to present quotes from Hillary which said that people had made up their minds on the emails anyway. This article did have quotes from the Trump stating that the system had been rigged and that Hillary deserves to be locked up, in order to balance out the statements about the information in the emails not being significant. In the end Fox news tended to state only facts, but the article did indicate that Hillary deserves all the blame for her emails. While the CBS article tried to show that Clinton should not be fully blamed, due to the fact that the investigation was not able to prove anything. Although even the CBS article goes on to state that Trump and many republicans along with the public itself have been doubting the FBI, similar to the Fox article. Both Fox and CBS have evidence that Clinton deserves to face the consequences of what she has done, but unlike Fox, CBS also goes to protect Hillary, stating that the information in these emails was not proven to be illegal, and the investigation was proven to favor Hillary. Bias exists everywhere, people’s opinions reflect what they report.
For example, in Fox news, they reported an article from Trump’s side, he was portrayed as the victim, when in reality it was not certain why polls had been kept open longer. CBS reported both sides of this certain topic, but CBS is not excluded when bias is mentioned. CBS reports articles about Eric Trump’s “illegal ballot selfie”, and how Trump’s children were not able to vote in the primary either, due to the fact that they forgot to register. An article which was not reported on Fox. Although Fox reported about the fact that a man who was dying in Florida could not vote for Trump, because his signature did not match the one on the voting registration. It went on to state that this has been the cause of many votes not being counted, but this was not reported on CBS. Fox News reported around three articles in which people were not able to vote for Trump, none of which were mentioned on CBS. While CBS had multiple articles about Russia getting involved in the United States election. Fox not only did not mention anything about Russia, but tended to stay clear of any news about Putin. Fox news tends to report their articles from Trump’s point of view, while CBS tries to maintain an equal balance of views but tends to shift the blame to Trump. Fox goes on to describe Trump as a successful businessman and states that Hillary Clinton’s email investigation was “long overdue”. Both news sources displayed some kind
of bias, weather it be in favor of one candidate or against one candidate. With what I observed, I can state that Fox news tends to lean towards Trump, while CBS doesn’t support Hillary, although they don’t seem to lean towards Trump. CBS tends to have a closepin report, they report about Hillary, but they do not support her they state the facts, they seem to think Trump is the worser of the candidates and will report negative articles about this specific Republican Candidate. In the end everyone has opinions, and no matter how unbiased a reporter tries to be, those opinions show in their articles. What they believe portrays what they write about and report, and how they present a certain topic. This project has helped me recognize bias in the media. Articles are written in such a way, that they look as if they are not favoring a certain ideology, but this is proven false when you compare one news source to another. Sometimes only one side of the story is shown, and the other would have never been known unless you looked at another news source. Bias is everywhere, people are not able to conceal their personal beliefs, and for journalists it reflects what they report. In general, bias exists no matter what, our personal beliefs affect what we say and what we do and the same goes for the media, their personal opinions and ideas affect what is reported, it is inevitable.