8/2/2018

BUSH/CONGRESS/ELECTION/OBAMA/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Positive references to President Donald Trump in June and July congressional campaign ads bested even those of President George W. Bush — whose approval ratings after 9/11 were some of the highest ever seen — at the same point in 2002, according to a new analysis. Bush was mentioned positively in about 14% of the 2002 midterm campaign ads over that two-month period, compared with Trump’s 15% in 2018…Indeed, former President Barack Obama weighs in with the most negative mentions of the three presidents in the 2002-2018 midterm election years surveyed, largely from Republicans, at 16% for 2010 and nearly 27% in 2014 over the two-month period. And Obama got barely any positive mentions, at only 1% in both midterm election years. Bush was mentioned negatively in almost no ads in June and July 2002; Trump’s negative mentions were nearly 10% of the 2018 ads over the same period, according to the project. In 2006, Bush faced harsher negative ads on the Democratic side and significantly fewer positive ads — dropping nearly 20 percentage points in positive mentions in Republican-sponsored ads. Most of Trump’s positive mentions come from Republican-sponsored advertisements, but nearly 5% of them come from Democratic ones. “

-Grace Sparks, “Mentions of Trump in campaign ads are more positive than even Bush post-9/11,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, August 2, 2018 4:24 pm