- Research looked at 130,231 headlines across 550 news organizations in the past three months
- It turns out that Harris has made a huge leap forward in the ‘sentiment’ score since being nominated
It’s official: Joe Biden’s decision to step aside in favor of Kamala Harris actually led to an increase in positive headlines about the Democratic Party campaign, an AI-powered analysis of US media coverage has found.
A study of 130,231 headlines from 550 news organizations over the past three months found that Republicans complain that Harris has it easy in the media.
Although Trump’s sentiment spiked after he was shot, it was quickly replaced by an increase in positive feelings for Harris.
According to Wilson Chan, CEO of Permutable AI, which conducted the analysis, this is partly due to her transformation from running mate to top contender.
“We all thought the assassination attempt would tighten his grip, but we don’t see that. It’s kind of a plateau, whereas Kamala Harris’ sentiment actually increases over time.
Analysis by Permutable AI tracks sentiment around Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, showing how Harris has seen an increase in positive headlines since Joe Biden announced he was dropping out of the race and his party rallied behind his vice president
“And it’s not just increasing. We’ve seen an explosion in volumes over the last two or three weeks.”
His company’s AI technology provides real-time “sentiment analysis” of thousands of companies.
He said it was easy to look at the two candidates for the US election.
The algorithm assigns a score from 0 (negative) to 100 (most positive) to each headline associated with their name.
According to Harris, recent negative headlines have suggested that it was bad for the party to switch candidates so late in the race, or that its policies or values were unknown.
For example, this headline in the Arizona Daily Sun scored only four points: “Bad policies, not gender, will cost Kamala Harris the presidency.”
‘Kamala Harris focuses on final candidates for her vice presidential nomination, sources say’ (CBS News) was rated neutral, scoring 50 points.
And a New York Times headline, “Kamala Harris Quickly Gains Democratic Support as 2024 Race Heats Up,” scored a whopping 97 points.
The study looked at 130,231 headlines across 550 news organizations over the past three months and gave a score of 0-100 to the headlines for Donald Trump and Kamala Harris
This headline, in an op-ed by Newt Gingrich for Fox News, scored 75 points in the analysis
This headline in the New York Times was worth a whopping 97 points
A graph of the results shows that Harris has generally outperformed Trump over the past three months, despite generating far more traffic.
He jumped when a sniper’s bullet grazed his ear at a rally in Pennsylvania.
But his lead was short-lived. When Biden stepped aside and his party quickly aligned itself with Harris, her sentiment rating exploded, quickly overtaking Trump’s.
“She has a comfortable lead in terms of sentiment,” Chan said.
“And the volumes will continue to be here. We expect there to be continued volume because she is now the leader of the party.”
The data also shows how news organizations view the candidates and how their headlines tend to favor one candidate or the other.
The analysis can also be used to determine which news organizations are making it easier for which candidates.
Unsurprisingly, Harris does well on the New York Times (with a sentiment score of around 55, compared to 49 for her opponent), while Trump scores 49 on Fox News, compared to a score of less than 46 for his opponent.
The overall results reflect a strong two weeks for Harris. Not only has she secured the nomination, she has attracted record levels of donations and surpassed Trump in FiveThirtyEight’s rolling average of polls.