The new research offers a troubling reflection on the American media environment and on risks to the nation’s democracy.Ī case in point came just this week, when Fox News agreed to pay $787.5 million to settle claims by Dominion Voting Systems that the network had repeatedly broadcast erroneous reports about fraud associated with Dominion machines - claims that Fox executives and on-air stars apparently knew to be false.įound that nearly two-thirds of Republicans continue to believe that Democrat Joe Biden won the presidential election through fraud. And neither side almost ever watches the other.” “Likewise, MSNBC is pulling those to the left further left.
“Most people who tune in to Fox News lean to the right, but Fox draws them further to the right,” Broockman said. That suggests a significant bloc of voters could become more extreme and perhaps polarized by a media diet that does not include a more balanced mix of information. These numbers represent tens of millions of American TV consumers, Broockman said, some of them already strong partisans, but many whose views are not yet extreme.
