News in Review: Thursday, March 9, 2023

What does the news landscape look like?

Fox News remains the top story in political news. The story incapsulates Dominion’s defamation lawsuit against Fox along with Tucker Carlson’s airing of January 6 footage. It has pulled significant attention away from the top story earlier this week, the 2024 GOP presidential race.

This is how the top stories were covered on each side of the media yesterday:

• Fox News / Carlson (85% more on the left)

• Mexico Kidnapping / Border (146% more on the right)

• COVID / Lab leak (205% more on the right)

Media bias ratings are from AllSides.

This is how articles from liberal and conservative outlets were distributed over the past five days among the top stories.

Liberal outlets used these words more than conservative outlets:

• murdoch (15.3x)

• dominion (8x)

• rupert (6.9x)

Conservative outlets used these words more than liberal outlets:

• redfield (48.6x)

• cartels (26.3x)

• fauci (23.2x)

What is happening in the top stories?

Now for a deep dive into our top three stories, starting with…

Fox News / Carlson

• Dominion Voting Systems is suing Fox News for $1.6 billion over allegations of fraud during the 2020 presidential election.

• Evidence has been produced that suggests prominent people at Fox knew the fraud allegations were untrue.

• Fox News host Tucker Carlson has been defending the Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, but private communications show him offering scorn of the GOP’s standard-bearer.

• Fox News is relying on a nearly 60-year-old Supreme Court ruling to defend itself against the defamation lawsuit.

• Carlson released never-before-seen footage of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, describing it as “mostly peaceful chaos,” despite multiple deaths and injuries.

Mexico Kidnapping / Border

• The White House rejects Republican lawmakers’ suggestion to designate Mexican drug cartels as terrorist groups, stating that it would have minimal benefits.

• The US has powerful sanctions authorities to combat narcotics trafficking organizations and has not been afraid to use them.

• Republican Representative James Comer suggests setting up troops in Mexico following the kidnapping and deaths of two Americans.

• The US State Department issues travel advisories for states in Mexico due to widespread violent crime, and the FBI seeks the public’s help in identifying the kidnappers of four Americans who were shot at and kidnapped in northern Mexico.

COVID / Lab leak

• The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic held a hearing on the origins of the pandemic, with Republicans focusing on the lab leak theory.

• Former CDC Director Robert Redfield testified before the House panel investigating the origins of the novel coronavirus and supported the lab-leak hypothesis.

• Anthony Fauci has been accused of engaging in a “cover-up” in light of fresh intelligence disclosures concerning the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.

• Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin criticized former President Donald Trump for his meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping during the early months of the pandemic.