In the grand scheme of checks and balances on authoritarian tendencies, the media ideally plays an impartial role as a guardrail against democratic backsliding. 2016 posed a unique challenge to this system in the U.S. Then Republican-nominee Donald Trump’s claims and public attacks on verified media outlets challenged the ability of the Fourth Estate to be an effective watchdog over government accountability and undermined traditional systems of truthful reporting. Since then, President Trump’s strained relationship with the media has had interesting implications for his claims to political legitimacy and has shown an alternative to outright authoritarian acquisition of the news media.
In contrast to the way that other stealth authoritarians acquire media empires or silence their opposition, the first thing that stands out about Trump’s approach to controlling the sources of information is his shift to social media as an official governmental communication platform. [1] Trump circumvents the checks on executive accountability posed by the traditional news media by turning to Twitter instead. Whereas before government Twitter accounts were run primarily to reiterate announcements already disseminated by official sources, Trump’s transformation of Twitter into a primary source of information on the actions of the executive branch allowed him to be the press to the punch. Trump doesn’t need to consolidate the media behind him like Putin did because he has carved out a platform for himself on the Internet. [2] Though it certainly helps to have something more mainstream, like Fox News, on his side, the blue checks and the official Twitter handle, like it or not, lend credibility to the words produced by the President.
The misinformation disseminated by Donald Trump on Twitter contributes to polarization within the U.S. because it finds purchase within those more likely to agree with his viewpoints and believe them. [3] Moreover, fact checkers and banners alerting viewers that they are interacting with contested election claims or false information are not effective in changing the minds of those who already agree with and support Donald Trump. [4]
Up until this point Trump’s criticisms of the media targeted verified news outlets for being biased towards the political left. The moniker of “Lamestream Media” stuck out among his usual stream of epithets and polarized the Fourth Estate itself. Objectivity in news reportage could no longer be assumed and Donald Trump’s continual barrage against CNN and favoritism of Fox News only exacerbated the politicized division of news outlets.
Over the course of the 2020 election Fox and CNN continued to present two alternative versions of America. When on November 7th CNN and other major news outlets called the election in Biden’s favor, Fox News not only held off on confirming the outcome, but also criticised the other news outlets for making the call too soon. Barely fifteen minutes later, they made the same call themselves. Simultaneously, Donald Trump’s responses claiming his victory in the election on Twitter were flagged by the platform.
Similarly, earlier that week major news platforms cut away from Donald Trump’s speech alleging voter fraud and CNN and Fox News followed up the broadcast from the White House with a statement about the lack of evidence to the claims. Even as Fox News continued to cover court challenges in Pennsylvania, the network made an effort to express concern at the rhetoric employed by Donald Trump. This later prompted the President to retweet a series of Tweets about the legitimacy of Fox News, causing #foxnewsisdead to becoming a trending hashtag on Twitter.
Throughout the past week, the war waged by the President on the media has been a testament to the fact that stealth authoritarians have other avenues of undermining the media as a democratic guardrail other than the traditional methods of buying out news sources and silencing opposition. Donald Trump’s four years in office have shown that it is possible to sidestep key components that contribute to the robustness of democracies, such as the press, in order to install one’s own hegemony. His meteoric rise, partially attributed to his weaponization of misinformation in the digital age, is a warning sign for many elections to come. The lesson in this is that it forces us to change our perception of authoritarian figures as individual phenomena that are products of polarized societies. Instead, we should recognize that they exist not only purely in the political sphere, but also leverage non-traditional methods to gain power.
[1] Varol, Ozan. “Stealth Authoritarianism.” Iowa Law Review 100 (n.d.): 1673–1742 [2] Scott Gehlbach (2010) Reflections on Putin and the Media, Post-Soviet Affairs, 26:1, 77-87, DOI: 10.2747/1060-586X.26.1.77 [3]Maja Adena, Ruben Enikolopov, Maria Petrova, Veronica Santarosa, Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, Radio and the Rise of The Nazis in Prewar Germany , The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 130, Issue 4, November 2015, Pages 1885–1939, https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjv030 [4] Barrera Rodriguez, Oscar and Guriev, Sergei and Henry, Emeric and Zhuravskaya, Ekaterina, Facts, Alternative Facts, and Fact Checking in Times of Post-Truth Politics (July 1, 2019).
Hi Stasya! As a journalism major, I found your post particularly interesting. I agree with you that it is important to note that while Twitter will attempt to notify users of false information, most users will ignore this notice. Logically, people should see these warnings, then question Trump’s claims. Instead, Trump will use populist rhetoric and spin the situation away from a conversation about his blatant misinformation and towards claims of Twitter attempting to silence the truth. Furthermore, Trump’s repeated attacks on news outlets delegitimized the media in many of his supporters’ eyes, allowing them to participate in this blind support without interference. In relation with your argument, it’s also important to note the amount of information and news sources available today. Due to the rise of the Internet, there is an overload of information sources. This means that people can choose to solely subscribe to sources that simply confirm their beliefs rather than challenging them. It also means that there are a lot of platforms that claim to be “news” but are not journalistic platforms at all. I think this is another factor as to why Trump can maintain his credibility in his supporters’ eyes even when his claims have no basis. When their news calls Trump out, they can simply switch to another platform or source. Trump’s Twitter usage definitely changed the game in politics and is very concerning. I agree with your point that authoritarian figures must be evaluated differently now. Just because a leader is not buying out media or enacting libel laws does not mean that they are not interfering with the information sphere. There should definitely be more research on this sort of democratic backsliding.
I found your analysis of Trump’s Twitter intriguing and insightful! I am also concerned by the increasingly authoritarian decisions that Trump has made in recent weeks in response to the media’s coverage of him. Even more so, I am concerned by the vast portion of America that wholeheartedly has come to believe through Trump’s leadership that the media is untrustworthy and fake news if it does not side with Donald Trump. Your blog pointed to this very well, but the fact that Fox News has changed from a right wing favorite and the choice of the President to #foxnewsisdead simply because they conveyed legitimate election results, like all other major news outlets, that were not in the President’s favor is very telling and concerning for the future of American democracy. I would further question whether Fox News will ultimately recuperate after being discredited by its most prominent fan, and whether Trump’s twitter loses any legitimacy in the eyes of his base over this breakup with Fox News? In addition, does the use of Twitter for political discourse in general degrade the caliber of the information, or has Twitter become so normalized as a conversation tool between the public and political candidates that it is irreversibly part of political discourse now? With its increased censorship and warning flags for potential misinformation, is Twitter fueling Trump’s base in the fight against media, or do these warnings serve the American public by shielding them from misinformation? Your argument is carried out wonderfully and I hope to see more conversation regarding this topic among political scholars!
Hi Stasya, this is a really insightful look into the way Trump used the media to bolster his power as a stealth authoritarian. I found especially interesting how you noted that him carving out his own way to disseminate information bypassed the need to bring the mainstream media behind him the way Putin does. However I do think this is complicated by attempts by Twitter to limit the spread of fake news. Implicitly in your discussion of mainstream news outlets I think you acknowledge the fact that these news outlets have a higher standard for what they publish with regards to their stories’ veracity and that is why they’ve become a de facto check on authoritarian power. Now that Twitter is beginning to crack down on the spread of misinformation I am very curious to see if this elevates them to a similar platform as mainstream news outlets where they are better able to curate the information that that goes viral. Furthermore I wonder what sort of impact this will have on would-be stealth authoritarians that now understand the power of using social media instead of consolidating the mainstream media. Will this create a push and pull between the mainstream media and would be authoritarians in a battle for control over information? Will Twitter continue to recognize the control they have over the spread of information and emerge as the next generation of mainstream media? I’m sure these are questions we are both curious to find out. Overall, this was a very though provoking piece – great job.