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On September 16, Republican candidates for the 2016 GOP nomination are to take the national stage for the second in a series of 12 debates. Viewers across the country will once again have the chance to listen to a hoard of candidates share conservative positions on issues like immigration reform and abortion, and try to determine whether or not Donald Trump’s hair is real. Like the last debate, this one will certainly be a lively event, but it’s increasingly questionable how dominant an impact televised debates can have in a country of busy people with short attention spans. It’s becoming more and more convenient for the American people to follow the candidates on social media — and the savviest of political competitors are responding to this development.
If one wishes to grasp the importance of mass media in the current presidential campaigns, they can simply track the overwhelming success of Donald Trump. Trump is speaking directly to the people, both physically on the campaign trail and virtually on social media. He even has his own hashtag trending on Twitter: #MakeAmericaGreatAgain.
What Trump understands is the fact that modern politics is as much about entertaining the American people as it is about proving one’s ability to solve the problems plaguing the nation. In the race for 2016, the candidate that will come out on top will be the one best able to fill the screens we all spend such a large portion of our days devoted to — and that means, increasingly, our smartphones and laptops.
Another politician currently proving the importance of social media in today’s election climate is Vermont senator Bernie Sanders. Despite being relatively unknown prior to announcing his intentions to run for the democratic nomination, Sanders is setting the tone for how modern politicians can use social media to their advantage, and The Guardian recently pronounced him the king of social media because of it. However, unlike Trump, Sanders is not trying to entertain his followers; rather, he is using media outlets like Facebook and Twitter as a platform to fully engage with his supporters. Partly because of this, Sanders was able to trounce Democratic favorite Hillary Clinton in the recent New Hampshire polls. All indications seem to suggest that Sanders’ social media presence is causing people everywhere, and especially his political competitors, to #FeelTheBern.
The trend of increasing importance of mass media in politics is not a new phenomenon. It first became prevalent in 1960, when a then-unknown senator from Massachusetts named John F. Kennedy took the stage against the Vice President of the nation, Richard Nixon, in the first televised presidential debate in US history. Despite all indications that Nixon would come out on top, with his superior TV presence, Kennedy was able to dazzle the American people, capturing their hearts — and ultimately, the race for the presidency. Since then, politics, especially in terms of presidential campaigns, have only become more dependent on the media presence candidates are able to create.
All forms of mass media are important aspects of modern politics. But as Sanders and Trump have discovered, the most influential tool in recent presidential campaigns is social media, due to its ability to gain the attention and support of the American people both instantaneously and continuously. In 2012, it aided President Obama in his victory over Mitt Romney, as evidenced by his greater number of Facebook likes, Twitter followers and YouTube subscribers; Obama enjoyed more presence in the daily lives of a population obsessed with their virtual lives.
While there has yet to be statistical analysis of the role social media will play in the outcome of the current presidential race, reports predict that candidates will have spent a collective $1 billion on digital campaign ads once the race is over — a 5000 percent increase from 2008, and half of that money will be focused on social media. If the trend of the last election continues, the next president might be the candidate whose Twitter game is stronger than the average political participant.
The implications of the increasing dependence of presidential campaigns on mass media, specifically social media, are still up for debate. On one hand, social media enables candidates to be more in tune with the national audience and more ready develop campaign goals that directly reflect what supporters want.
Conversely, it might also be causing candidates to oversimplify their positions on issues to the confines of a 140-character tweet. This becomes a problem when the the issues are far too complex for such limitations. Also problematic is the tendency for people to simply follow the candidate whose views seem to be most closely aligned with their own, rather than going through the hassle of critically judging all the candidates and voting for the one who is best for the country as a whole. When it comes time to elect the next president, many voters may choose a candidate whose policy goals they only know within the context of social media, because they know even less about the goals of the others. In the race for 2016, it is clear that social media will play a major role; but when it comes to who we want to lead our nation, are we comfortable electing the person with the most retweets, or the one who comprehends how the issues we face need to be addressed?
Contact Staff Writer Emily McPeak at emily.mcpeak@colorado.edu.
