Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr Phoenix Top Media Market Cycle-to-Date   (MIDDLETOWN, CT) October 21, 2020 – A new brief report from the Wesleyan Media Project finds record levels of television advertising in the 2020 campaigns. Over 4.9 million ads have aired in federal races (House, Senate and president) on broadcast and national cable television since January of 2019 (Figure 1). That volume is more than twice the volume of ad airings in the 2012 and 2016 presidential election cycles—and well above the previously record-setting mid-term election ad volumes in 2018.   Figure 1: Volume of Federal Advertising by Cycle (2012-2020) Numbers…

Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr Biden up big in ad war,overtakes Trump in recent digital spend   Report Highlights President Top TV spenders in the presidential race (Table 1) Biden overtakes Trump in digital advertising (Table 2) Pro-Biden ads outnumber pro-Trump ads in all top media markets (Table 3) Map of presidential candidate TV ad airings (Figure 1) and interactive map of Facebook advertising (Figure 2) Pro-Trump ads much more negative than ads for Biden (Figure 3) Biden stresses pandemic, healthcare; Trump talks jobs, immigration (Table 4) US Senate Dems lead ad race in all top Senate contests (Table 5) Digital ad…

Photo: Thru_the_Glass/Flickr Jobs, Business, Taxes Top Trump Issues in TV Ads; Biden Focuses on Virus   (MIDDLETOWN, CT) September 17, 2020 – A new analysis from the Wesleyan Media Project finds that, at least on television, Donald Trump’s advertising has shifted away from his almost exclusive focus on crime and protests (as highlighted in our August 12 report) to more “bread and butter” Republican issues. Over the past five weeks, Trump’s ads have focused on jobs, business and taxes, with each issue appearing in over half of his ads (Table 1). Immigration has also been highlighted by the Trump campaign,…