Initial Findings

1. INITIAL FINDINGS
Jordon Pollard

2. RECAP
• Topic –
• Do news outlets skew perception of supreme court decisions based on outlet partisan leanings?
• Methodology –
• Qualitative Content Analysis
• Outlets: CNN, Fox News, ABC News, NBC News
• Cases: DC v. Heller, Arizona v. United States, Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, Obergefell v. Hodges
• First batch of articles were the immediate coverage of court decisions
• Hypothesis & Research Questions –
• H1 – News outlets will choose information from court cases to frame the decision and promote their
perception of the decision
• R1 – Does news coverage of court cases promote a greater knowledge of the court and its decisions?

3. CNN
• Covered every case, and provided links to each actual decision (excluding DC v.
Heller)
• Coverage focused less on facts of the case but acted more as a political analysis of
the decision.
• Coverage of each case was heavily rooted in the political history, implications, and
reaction to the cases
• Does not provide in depth analysis of the facts of the case, spreading out the facts
between comments by political or individuals involved with the case.
• At some point in each article describes the political leanings of the two sides, and
how they voted.
• Does little to persuade its audience that the Supreme Court acts as an apolitical
body and makes legal decisions not based on political ideologies.
• Does not frame cases differently, but highlights the political divide behind the case.

4. FOX NEWS
• Found articles covering only three of the cases (no article found listed for Obergefell (DC v.
Heller article just a repost of the Associated Press article and does not provide adequate
analysis of how Fox News portrays the decisions)
• The article discussing Arizona v. US is combined with an article discussing Mitt Romney’s
reaction to the decision.
• By combining the articles, Fox News implicitly endorses Romney’s position in its “coverage”
and frames the article as a bad for conservatism and federalism
• Does provide objective coverage of the Hobby Lobby case, but implicitly frames the case as
a loss for liberals. “The court’s four liberal justices dissented.”
• Overall Fox News does use agenda setting to support their view of the cases (as observed in
the two articles), specifically a conservative perception.
• Does not position the court as political as compared to CNN.
• While no articles were found about the Arizona and Obergefell cases, the articles/videos that
came up first as a result of searching the outlets website discussed how the court got it
wrong, and the faults of Justice Anthony Kennedy

5. ABC NEWS
• ABC News did provide coverage of every case, but oversimplifies the cases and
heavily leans coverage to the winning side of the case.
• Frames the Arizona case as a federalism case, but does little to provide coverage of
the states position
• For the last three cases, the coverage would provide the basic information about the
case: decision, reasoning, and arguments of both sides
• ABC does not attempt to frame the cases politically, but does not avoid mentioning
the political importance and implication of the cases
• Agenda setting theory does not hold with these cases, but the outlet does little to
assist in improving knowledge about cases in general

6. NBC NEWS
• Covered 3 caes (Arizona, Hobby Lobby, Obergefell)
• Unlike the other outlets, provides more balanced coverage cases making it the most
objective outlet.
• Does not avoid the political implications, but does not highlight the divide.
• Like ABC oversimplifies the facts of the case, and like CNN offers more commentary
than facts

7. PRELIMINARY CONCLUSION
• Excluding Fox News, the other outlets are able to attempt to remain objective in the
coverage of court cases
• Does not help change the perception of the court as not a political body, CNN was the worst
at implying the political aspects of the court
• While my hypothesis is not supported generally, Fox News did support the hypothesis,
Agenda Setting is still applicable to the study. By simplifying the court decisions, each outlet
is practicing agenda setting by providing their audience with the information about the
cases they choose. CNN specifically wants its audience to view the court through a political
lens.
• Most hyperlinked the actual court opinion, but none discussed the finding of the decision
with more than a couple of lines from the opinion.