The Tone of Spanish‐Language Presidential News Coverage

Abstract

Objectives I explore whether the tendency of English‐language news broadcasts to favor negative coverage of the president contrasts with Spanish‐language news coverage of the president, especially because a Latino news audience should prefer more positive stories of a Democratic president. I also examine whether presidential speeches and the political environment influence the tone of presidential news coverage. Methods I describe the tone of presidential news coverage and use ordinary least squares regression to explain influences on the tone of Spanish‐ and English‐language presidential news coverage for 85 broadcast days and over 50 stories each in early 2011. Results NBC Nightly News is more negative than Noticiero Telemundo is in its coverage of the U.S. president. Although higher presidential approval ratings offer the president more positive news coverage on both networks, Latino support for President Obama does not encourage mostly positive coverage of immigration coverage on Spanish‐language news. Conclusion Presidents can expect less negative coverage on Spanish‐language news, but not necessarily on immigration policy, an issue of central importance to the Latino community.

Presidential Leadership, the News Media, and Income Inequality

“…Presidential speeches increase the positive tone of newspaper coverage when the president is a voice in the story (Cohen 2010). Going local leads to more positive coverage for the president in local newspapers (Barrett and Peake 2007; Eshbaugh-Soha and Peake 2006) and even on Spanish-language television news (Eshbaugh-Soha 2014). Moreover, Wood (2007) illustrates that presidential optimism affects public opinion on the economy through the public’s perception of the tone of news coverage, even though he does not show that presidential optimism shapes the content of news programming.…”