Compare CNN and ABC news coverage of Donald Trump’s tax denial

Compare CNN and ABC news coverage of Donald Trump’s tax denial

Question

Traditional Journalism

Do both stores use a traditional journalistic perspective to present the story? Explain your answer.

Are the sources used in the stories relevant or reliable? Why or why not?
Is the message of the story the same as the message expressed by each medium? What is the message of each story?

Does one story seem more believable to you than another? Explain.

As stated in your handbook, honesty, neutrality, and accuracy are the three criteria for determining information quality. Does every story have all three? Does a story have more or less one of the three qualities? What prompted you to identify this?
A joint CNN and ABC report is selected here; it is Donald Trump’s tax allegations and Trump’s justification in response to the New York Times (New York Times, 2020). The script of the two short stories is different but the concept is the same.

The concept of traditional journalism is unbiased and dependent on evidence to support reporting. The role of a journalist in traditional journalism is completely out of the box to portray the positive side (Barnes, 2016). This is a Trump tax story, ABC and CNN have been unbiased despite knowing that Donald Trump is President, they represent real scenarios of unpaid taxes. Therefore, it is easy to say that both news agencies follow the concept of traditional journalism.

In the story above, CNN and ABC provided news feeds after each story; both use The New York Times as their source of information. The New York Times is the highest-rated new newspaper in the United States and can therefore be considered a reliable source of news (Hicks, 2018). ABC News described the story in a variety of styles; they refer to the words of Donald Trump Jr. and Donald Trump’s secretary in the same way. However, numbers and numbers appear the same in both stories, and the message they convey about taxes, even if you are the tax-paying president, cannot be avoided.

Both news organizations follow basic journalistic principles and represent Donald Trump’s tax concerns with the necessary resources; it is a difficult choice to determine which is the most reliable. However, ABC News in the article provided a selective image of Trump, captured by The New York Times during a press conference, and the exact words of Donald Trump Jr. “This is ridiculous. My father paid ten million dollars in taxes” (Phelps, 2020). A story with pictures is more compelling to believe (EBSCO Post, 2017).

Source of use

The basic criteria for judging a story is to determine its truthfulness, neutrality and accuracy. And the idea of ​​objectivity must be present in the story to avoid any perception (Potter, 2016). In the neutrality parameter, the two stories are almost equal, CNN and ABC news both provide Donald Trump’s data and tax records with reliable sources and are unbiased in highlighting issues related to the relationship. regarding the president. In terms of accuracy, CNN has provided a little more information about Trump’s business. However, ABC used pictures and sayings to reinforce the story. Thus, with numbers, data, images and statements, the quality of both stories can be determined.

In the story above, the purpose of ABC and CNN was to introduce the public to the Trump tax story. Despite the bias, CNN and ABC have given the exact tax figure. Knowing that Trump is a famous businessman and president of the country, some of them may be biased from a business perspective, however, they did fair press and portrayed the true story. Furthermore, the aim of both media is not to target Trump but to highlight financial concerns. So the basics of journalism follow.

If any of the stories above are biased, they may have overlooked the basic rules of journalism, honesty, neutrality, and accuracy. My suggestion to the aforementioned news agencies is to make an objective story that follows journalistic ethics. And the most important thing for neutral reporting is to follow the concept of objectivity and stay out of the box, to avoid perception (Potter, 2016). Racial prejudice is thinking about a particular type, culture, group of people, society, and nationality. Similarly, a gender-specific behavior or attitude is considered a gender stereotype (Rogers & Meltzoff, 2017). According to the above criteria, the report is free of gender and race biases.

As analyzed above, the story seems objective and factual, however, it completely depends on the context and content of how people understand it. CNN and ABC stories describe the situation of a president who was featured in the news for not paying his federal taxes in full. The plot is similar but both have different backgrounds and plots. CNN focuses more on President Trump’s wealth and businesses (Toh, 2020). Considering that the headlines of news content seem to be effectively categorized. An important thing should have been in the photo of Donald Trump at the press conference to attract more readers (Rao, 2019).

ABC’s report is Trump’s vindication to the New York Times by including tax allegation. They show the content of Trump and his family’s justification, and provide factual statements given to The New York Times, with a credible image. However, the story may contain more details about Donald Trump’s assets and businesses, so that the reader has knowledge of Trump’s wealth, which in turn can educate the reader about the current situation and tax concerns. A story must be completed for the audience to understand its meaning (Potter, 2016).

People understand history according to their own interests and perceptions. There are many possible interpretations of the story. It’s important to shape your news stories according to your audience’s interests. In some cases, if your message or story is unique and interesting to your audience, you need to provide full detail, without prejudice, with appropriate language. There are also some viewer expectations. Failure to do so may negatively impact news (University of Pittsburgh, 2020).

Burns, C. (2016). Citizen journalism vs. traditional journalism: The case for collaboration. Caribbean Quarterly, 58(3), 16-27.

Contributions to EBSCO. (November 2017). A picture is worth a thousand words – The benefits of picture books for reading comprehension. Retrieved September 2020 from EBSCO article: https://www.ebsco.com/blog/article/seeing-is-believing-the-benefits-of-picture-books-for-building-reading-skill

R. Hicks (December 2018). How does the New York Times maintain its credibility? Retrieved September 2020 from Quill: https://www.quillmag.com/2018/12/15/how-the-new-york-times-maintains-its-credibility/

New York Times. (September 2020). Long-hidden records reveal Trump’s chronic losses and years of tax evasion. Retrieved September 2020 from The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/27/us/donald-trump-taxes.html

Phelps, J. (2020, September). Trump and the White House have mixed denial and justification for the New York Times’ tax reporting. From ABC News he retrieved September 2020: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-white-house-blend-denials-justifications-reaction-york/story?id=73291795&cid=clicksource_4380645_4_three_posts_card_image

Potter, W (2016). Media Literacy (8th Edition). Los Angeles: Sage. Rao, M. (January 2019). The power of storytelling: how to use stories to differentiate, connect, and influence. Retrieved September 2020 from Your Story: https://yourstory.com/2019/01/power-storyelling-use-stories-Differenceiate-connect-influence

Rogers, L.O. & Mertsov, A. N (2017). Is gender more important and meaningful than race? Analysis of race and gender identity in black, white, and multiracial children. American Psychological Association, 23(3), 323-334. Toh, M. (2020, 9). Retrieved September 2020 from CNN: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/09/28/business/trump-business-nyt-report/index.html

University of Pittsburgh. (2020). Audience analytics. Retrieved September 2020 from University of Pittsburgh: https://www.comm.pitt.edu/oral-comm-lab/audience-analysis