Smart Politics, a part of the University of Minnesota, analyzed whom the president calls upon for his press conference after Obama’s 36th news conference yesterday. The studies show that Fox News has been shut out many times from asking questions.
Eric Ostermeier of Smart Politics argues that Fox News doesn’t get its fair share of opportunities to ask questions. Even on Monday, Fox News was not called upon to ask the president questions about the debt ceilings.
During his first term, Barack Obama had adopted a tiered approach as to which media outlets get to ask questions. Though he departed from this routine occasionally by calling the reporters of digital-only media outlets (remember his first news conference in 2009?). But Fox rarely got the presidential nod at press conferences. Ostermeier pointed out that many other media outlets with smaller reach have received more questions.
The study found that reporters from ABC, CBS, Associated Press and NBS have been allowed to ask the most questions during president Obama’s solo press conferences. However, Fox News stands at the ninth spot, getting chances to attend just 39 percent of the press conferences overall.
Of the 36 solo press conferences, president Obama has called ABS news reporters 29 times. CBS was called on to 28 press conferences. The Associated Press comes in third with 27, followed by NBC with 26. Fox News lags at ninth spot with just 14 conferences. That means each of the top three networks have been able ask twice as many questions as Fox.
As far as individual reporters are concerned, ABC’s former White House correspondent Jake Tapper and NBC’s Chuck Todd have been called on 23 times each. Todd is known as the King of follow-up questions.
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