Poll: Share Of Trump Voters Who Call Fox News Their Most Trusted News Source Drops 24 Points Since 2016 – By Allah Pundit (Hot Air) / Feb 23 2021
The twisted irony of this result is that some segment of Trumpers now trust Fox less because Fox told them the truth. They famously called Arizona for Biden on election night — prematurely, but ultimately correct. They projected Biden the winner of the election a few days later. They’ve been a little more grounded in reality than their “competitors,” Newsmax and OAN, have been.
Emphasis on “a little.”
Yesterday I guesstimated based on the most recent polling data that the Republican Party is now a 50/30/20 proposition. Fifty percent are hardcore MAGA, to the point where they’re more loyal to Trump than to the party. Another 30 percent are pro-Trump but a bit more ambivalent about having to choose between him and the GOP. The last 20 percent are the Trump-skeptics, a rump but a sizable enough one that they can make mischief for the right in elections if they don’t stay onside. When it comes to righty cable news, though, the proportions may be different. Fifty (or rather 40) percent or so of Trump voters list some non-right news source as their most trusted; another 35-ish percent list Fox; and another quarter or do are diehard Trumpers who need the pure, uncut stuff from upstarts like Newsmax and OAN.
How that squares with the other 50/30/20 breakdown, God only knows. Presumably all of the hardcore MAGA are watching either Fox or its more populist rivals while the other 50 percent are spread out among many alternatives. Whatever the answer, the newsy part here is that Newsmax and OAN *have* made inroads with Trump voters over the past five years in terms of their relative trustworthiness. In 2016, 58 percent of Trump voters listed Fox as their most trusted news source. Today?
