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Trump Fails To Make State of the Union Ratings Great Again

January 31, 2018 By WHC Insider

Media Post’s  Joe Mandese reports that President Trump’s Nielson ratings are below previous presidents.

Donald Trump has been called the “ratings” President, because of his propensity to use the TV industry term to refer to his Presidential performance, and because he’s an ex-reality TV personality and producer. But based on Nielsen’s official ratings, the performance of his first State of the Union Address wasn’t exactly huge.

While it’s true that the ratings of Presidential State of the Union addresses have been trending downward in recent years, Trump’s first SOTU ranks only eighth in terms of viewers among the last 25 to be aired on the major broadcast and cable networks carrying it live, according to an analysis of Nielsen data.

Filed Under: 2012 WHC Garden Brunch, Donald Trump, The White House, Uncategorized Tagged With: ABC News, CNN, Donald Trump, Fox News, MSNBC, NBC News, Nielson ratings, State of the Union

Fox News Praised for Tough Questions in First GOP Debate, Candidates Vie for Attention on Crowded Stage

August 7, 2015 By WHC Insider

Debate PicRepublican candidates gathered together Thursday night for a highly anticipated first debate of the primary season in Cleveland, Ohio. Fox News anchors hurled tough and ambitious questions to candidates with Donald Trump starting things off by refusing to commit to not launching a third party bid, possibly undermining the future Republican nominee.

Moderator Megyn Kelly set the evening’s tone by confronting Trump about his past misogynistic comments on women, to which he responded he didn’t “have time for total political correctness.” Kelly asked Governor Scott Walker whether he could win a general election while possessing viewpoints out of the mainstream on abortion. Moderator Bret Baier confronted Senator Rand Paul on why he is “so quick to blame” his own party on foreign policy, which later incited a heated exchange between him and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie on phone data collection and national security.

“When you’re sitting in a subcommittee, just blowing hot air about this, you can say things like that,” Governor Christie fired at Senator Paul, who seconds later accused the governor for fundamentally misunderstanding the Bill of Rights and hugging President Obama. Christie looked presidential in his response that the hugs he remembered are with families who have lost loved ones in the September 11 attacks.

With such a crowded stage, fighting for time to speak was an inevitable factor. According to the Washington Post, the order of minutes spoken from most to least begins with Donald Trump at 10.31 minutes spoken, former Governor Jeb Bush with 8.47, Governor John Kasich with 6.56 minutes, former Governor Mike Huckabee with 6.50 minutes, and followed by Senator Marco Rubio, Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, Governor Chris Christie, Governor Scott Walker, and Senator Rand Paul.

When addressed for the second time, Ben Carson stated, “Well, thank you, Megyn, I wasn’t sure I was going to get to talk again.”

Ohio Governor John Kasich, who barely squeaked into the debate reserved for the top 10 polled Republican candidates, refused to be buried and presented himself as a formidable challenger. Placed on the far right side of the stage, due to his last place polling, Governor Kasich spoke to a more moderate leaning compassionate conservative. He said he would love his daughters unconditionally, even if they were gay, and defended his decision to expand Medicare in his home state. “Everybody has a right to their God-given purpose.”

The debate wrapped up around 11 pm, after a series of concise and rehearsed closing statements from the candidates.

The “Happy Hour” debate, which consisted of the seven Republican candidates who did not make the top 10 cut, took place earlier at 5 pm. Carly Fiorina received praise for her performance from multiple experts in Politico Magazine.

The next Republican debate will be hosted by CNN and Salem Radio at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California on Wednesday, September 16. The first Democratic debate will be held on October 13 in Nevada, hosted by CNN.

Filed Under: 2016 election, Event Coverage, News, Uncategorized Tagged With: Cleveland, Fox News, Presidential Election 2016, Republican Presidential Debate 2015, RNC

Fox News and their White House Correspondents' Dinner Friends

April 26, 2013 By WHC Insider

Bret & Amy Baier with Susan Axelrod

A day before the festivites, the official line-up of Fox News’ table at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner has been unveiled.

Per Deadline, “X-Men: Days of Future Past” director Bryan Singer and writer/producer Simon Kinberg will attend with Bill O’Reilly, Geraldo Rivera, Bret Baier and “Milk” writer Dustin Lance Black.

Previously announced were Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen (“X-Men”), Tim Daly (“Private Practice”), Kevin McHale and Colton Haynes (“Glee”), Joesph Mazzello (“G.I. Joe: Retaliation”), Ryan Kwanten (“True Blood”) and JC Chasez (“So You Think You Can Dance”).

The dinner takes place tomorrow night at the historic Hilton in Dupont Circle and will be presided over by Conan O’Brien–who, by the way, is already at the gates of the White House.

Filed Under: 2013 WHCD, Correspondents Tagged With: Bill O'Reilly, Bret Baier, Bryan Singer, Colton Haynes, Dustin Lance Black, Fox News, Geraldo Rivera, JC Hasez, Joesph Mazzello, Kevin McHale, Ryan Kwanten, Tim Daly, White House Correspondents Association, White House Correspondents Dinner

Insider Round-Ups: How To Fix Fox, Stephanopoulos Stays At This Week and D.C. Loves Zero Dark Thirty

December 11, 2012 By WHC Insider

It’s hard to figure out what’s worth your time with all the first reads, politico blasts and tweets that race by before your third coffee of the morning. So let us provide some curation to your otherwise blur of a morning before your second conference call.

  • Ana Marie Cox thinks less work for Rove at Fox is more of a “promotion” than a network reorganization.
  • TV Newser has George Stephanopoulos at ABC’s This Week through 2013.
  • The D.C. Metro area film critics love Kathryn Bigelow‘s Zero Dark Thirty (and The Master!)
  • Buzzfeed speaks to a Cory Booker backer betting big–to hell with alliteration–for a 2016 run.
  • Politico reports:South Carolina demands the good Dr. Stephen T. Colbert.
  • NPR lays out the differences in President Obama‘s second inauguration.
  • That should get you through at least your first lunch-that-gets-turned-into-a-coffee-break.

    Filed Under: Correspondents, DC, Entertainment, Insider Round-Ups, News Tagged With: Ana Marie Cox, Correspondents, Cory Booker, Fox News, George Stephanopoulos, Karl Rove, Kathryn Bigelow, Links, Media, News, Stephen Colbert, This Week, Zero Dark Thirty

    Montgomery Burns on the Fiscal Cliff

    December 5, 2012 By WHC Insider

    Mr. Burns on the Fiscal Cliff (via Fox)


    It’s unfair to say The Simpsons have a monopoly on politics. Leading up to the election this year, we’ve had the unusual pleasure of Mr. Montgomery Burns–billionaire and owner of the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant–discussing his political rhetoric and theory with us.

    [Read more…]

    Filed Under: Causes, Entertainment, Media Strategy Tagged With: Animation, Colbert Report, Daily Show, Fiscal Cliff, Fox News, Media, The Simpsons, Video

    Fox News Cuts Out The Red Rove Meat

    December 5, 2012 By WHC Insider


    Start out your humpday right: here’s why Karl Rove (or Dick Morris) will be on Fox News anytime soon.

    Reported yesterday by New York Magazine, it sounds like Roger Ailes has decided that Fox News should lick its wounds from Election 2012 just a little longer. Not because of partisan politics or earlier mandates, but mainly as an after-effect of the now-infamous meltdown Rove had on air about Ohio’s electoral voting system and Morris’ own haphazard readings. As it stands, according to NY Mag’s Gabriel Sherman, if producers want to use either talking head must be pre-approved from higher up in the Fox food chain.

    [Read more…]

    Filed Under: Correspondents, DC, News, News Media Tagged With: Correspondents, Dick Morris, Election 2012, Fox News, Karl Rove, News Media, Roger Ailes

    How Did MSNBC "Win" The Election Coverage?

    November 12, 2012 By WHC Insider

    Joe Scarborough & Mika Brzezinski

    If Nate Silver won the official election of who’s right, then who took home the popular vote? If you ask Brian Stelter, it was clearly MSNBC.

    In a parallel from from years ago, it seems like the 24-hour news channel has bulked up and turned itself around since the last presidential election. The channel’s rough start as “a CNN also-ran to an Anti-Fox” came to a huge change for the 2012 election as channel has morphed into a true counter-brand to Fox News. It required a four-year re-branding message, including a series of ads where notable on-air talent like Chris Matthews, Ed Schultz and Rachel Maddow stand before historic or iconic images–not to mention most were originally shot by Spike Lee.

    It could be that the tides are changing, as even Variety has Fox News as a major winner and loser on election night. Buried almost the the end in the lavish praise comes the always tantalizing anonymous sources familiar with all manners of media matter.  Supposedly The Washington Post’s Ezra Miller is being eyed for a possible weekend show along with Chris Hayes, or the coveted 8pm slot.  But that’s neither how, now or why. What’s important is recognizing that MSNBC is skewing itself to a younger market. Whether they’re accomplishing it by not having real-time debate reactions like CNN or eshewing making everything as “Extreme” as Fox News is still up in the air. There’s a shift to get rid of the old weekend documentaries (the “Lockup” series included) and tune to constant political coverage, or even discussion like The Cycle which kicks off seven hours of specialized talking heads.

    Either way, it seems like Fox News may have inadvertently followed the plot of Mean Girls too closely. The only question worth answering in the follow-up must be which network is Lindsey Lohan and which is Rachel McAdams. Maybe we’ll find out at next year’s White House Correspondents Dinner?

    Filed Under: 2012 Election, Correspondents, News Media Tagged With: 2012 Election, Chris Matthews, Ed Schultz, Ezra Miller, Fox News, MSNBC, Rachel Maddow

    Iowa's Most Wanted

    December 27, 2011 By WHC Insider

    If you want to understand the electoral process about to take place in Iowa read Real Clear Politics’ Scott Conroy’s Iowa primer.  “A week from today, somewhere between 80,000 to 150,000 Iowans are expected to head to their local precincts to participate in the caucus system that has governed the state’s politics since the mid-1800s.

    Even if turnout far exceeds projections, only a small percentage of Iowa’s 3 million residents will participate in the event that plays an outsized role in determining which Republican candidate will face off against President Obama in November — and possibly lead more than 300 million Americans over the next four years.

    Despite the national media saturation, the process by which the Iowa caucuses are run can seem incomprehensible even to politically attuned outsiders, and it is rarely explained in detail.

    But some quintessential Iowa quirks notwithstanding, the Republican caucuses are rather straightforward.

    Iowans who wish to participate on Jan. 3 must first find the voting site of their local precinct. The venues tend to change every four years, so even longtime caucus-goers are advised to double-check with one of the campaigns, the Iowa Republican Party website, or their local newspaper.

    There are 1,774 precincts in this year’s caucuses, and many of the state’s rural outposts will see just a trickle of participants. On the other hand, some of the more populous counties combine their precincts into one location, which means that thousands of caucus-goers will gather at a single location.

    Blackhawk County, for instance, is holding this year’s caucuses at the UNI-Dome, where the University of Northern Iowa football team plays its home games.

    The gatherings are run entirely by the state Republican Party, which will deliver to each precinct a list of registered Republicans as of Nov. 14.

    Once people start arriving at their caucus sites, they will be checked in and directed to their seats if they are already registered with the party. Non-Republican voters are allowed to register on site with the GOP upon providing a driver’s license or other photo ID with proof of residency and will be added instantly to the party’s registration rolls and can participate that night.

    Seventeen-year-olds who will turn 18 by Nov. 6, 2012 are allowed to take part.

    Refreshments are typically provided, and neighbors and friends will mingle before the session is called to order by a volunteer precinct captain.

    The caucuses begin at 7 p.m. Central Time, but Iowa GOP officials and the campaigns themselves encourage voters to show up early, since the process typically starts on time. Michele Bachmann’s website, for instance, directs supporters to be at their caucus precincts by 6:30 p.m. and does not mention that the event actually begins a half-hour later.

    After a few minutes of procedural business, the captains will move on to the main event: the Presidential Preference Poll.

    Each campaign will then be allowed to have one surrogate speak on its behalf. These speeches, which typically last two to three minutes, are among the most important elements of the entire process and figure to be even more critical this year, given the especially high percentage of undecided voters.

    “I hope to make a decision before I go in there, but a lot of people will actually go in there, visit with their neighbors not knowing what they’re going to do, and say, ‘Who do you support?’ ” said longtime Iowa Republican activist Becky Beach. “And what happens a lot is people who they are friends with or that they respect, they’ll vote with those people because they know them and like them.”

    In the past, well-organized campaigns have placed volunteer speech-givers at almost all of Iowa’s precincts, providing them with talking points for closing the deal.

    But in a year that has seen a much lower level of organizing than usual, not a single campaign has announced chairpersons in all 99 counties. Bachmann seems to have come the closest, as her campaign announced earlier this month that she has 91 counties covered.

    Mitt Romney’s campaign will not say how many county chairpersons it has in place, though the remnants of the extensive organizing Romney did in the state throughout 2007 may prove invaluable.

    At his Ida County precinct in 1996, Iowa GOP campaign veteran Tim Albrecht delivered his first caucus night speech on behalf of Pat Buchanan — while just a high school senior. According to Albrecht, the visual stimuli at each site can have a significant last-minute impact.

    “You want to plaster that room with your signs and plaster anyone who will wear one with a sticker, because people like to go with a winner when they are undecided this late,” he said.

    The candidates themselves will usually speak on their own behalf at one or two precincts in the more heavily populated counties.

    Once the speeches have concluded, voting begins promptly.

    Though methods may vary from precinct to precinct, each caucus-goer is typically handed a blank piece of paper on which to write the surname of the candidate for whom they are voting.

    “In our precinct, I know this sounds cliché, but we passed around a red-white-and-blue sequined shoebox with a hole slit in the top, and you drop your ballot in there,” said Iowa Republican Party Chairman Matt Strawn, who plans to attend his local caucus this year but will not vote out of deference to his position.

    In contrast to the far more complicated procedures involved in the Democratic process, Iowa Republicans do not maintain a viability threshold, and there is no second-choice realignment vote for candidates with little support.

    Votes will be tallied in full view of attendees at a table in the back of the room, where each campaign is allowed to station an observer.

    Decisions about misspellings are made by precinct leaders, but a liberal interpretation of voter intent is typically employed. There have been surprisingly few disputes over the years.

    The results for each precinct are announced to everyone who is still on hand, and precinct chairs then forward their counts to the Iowa Republican Party.

    The state GOP is likely to launch a website in the coming days, which it will use to announce the results as they come in on caucus night.

    In 2008, the Iowa GOP tabulated and announced the outcome soon after the caucuses closed, and the party has enacted further improvements that it hopes will help it determine the outcome even more efficiently.

    Unless the tally is extraordinarily close, the winner should have enough time to make a victory speech while most TV viewers on the East Coast are still awake.

    The candidates who decide to continue their campaigns will then hop on red-eye flights to New Hampshire, where a one-week sprint in the first-in-the-nation primary state begins promptly the next morning.” Thank you Scott!

    Filed Under: 2012 Election, Media Strategy, News, News Media Tagged With: cable news, Dana Perino, Fox News, Media, News

    Ailes: Clinton to Fox?

    June 7, 2011 By WHC Insider

    In a recent interview, Fox News President Roger Ailes seemed to shift from his traditionally conservative stance and may have developed a bit of a soft spot for some top Democrats. In an interview with Howard Kurtz, Ailes – the man who put Sarah Palin back on television – even said he’d hire Hillary Clinton: “She looks unhappy at the State Department. She’d get ratings.” See the full story on The Daily Beast here.

    Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Fox News, Hillary Clinton, Howard Kurtz, Roger Ailes, Sarah Palin

    Obama: Media Maestro

    February 7, 2011 By WHC Insider

    Dec. 7, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

    It may have been Steelers vs. Packers out on the field last night but Bill O’Reilly tried his best to get President Obama to fumble during their pre-Super Bowl interview on Fox News.

    As Susan Milligan points out in US News, the President deftly handled O’Reilly’s line of questioning and observes that Obama’s “behavior indicates he is unwilling to engage in petty political food fights.”

    O’Reilly: “Does it disturb you that so many people hate you?”

    Obama: “You know, the truth is that the people—and I’m sure previous presidents would say the same thing, whether it was Bush or Clinton or Reagan or anybody—the people who dislike you don’t know you.”

    The objective of Milligan’s piece was to point out media irresponsibility. But the O’Reilly/Obama interview is also another example of what John Harris and Jim VandeHei explore today in POLITICO: how the President is “playing the press like a fiddle.”

    He is doing it by exploiting some of the most long-standing traits among reporters who cover politics and government — their favoritism for politicians perceived as ideologically centrist and willing to profess devotion to Washington’s oft-honored, rarely practiced civic religion of bipartisanship.

    Click here to read the entire article on POLITICO.

    Filed Under: News Media Tagged With: Bill O'Reilly, Fox News, Jim VandeHei, John Harris, Politico, President Obama, Susan Milligan, US News

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    About White House Correspondents Insider

    Exploring “behind the scenes” of the most powerful city in the world — Washington, D.C. — and those who cover it.

    We track the White House Correspondents’ weekend and all the activities around it, from journalists and media companies to the White House and politicos.

    Tammy Haddad is Co-Founder and Editor-In-Chief of WHC Insider and CEO of Haddad Media.

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