New Rules for an Old Game? How the 2016 U.S. Election Caught the Press off Guard

Abstract

Traditionally, media coverage of political campaigns has been shaped by working routines that constitute a set of “rules” journalists follow. How did these rules fare in the U.S. 2016 election? We wanted to know journalists’ and political consultants’ answers to this question, and so we interviewed 24 of them, seeking their perspectives on how the traditional rules did (or did not) apply in 2016, and with what normative consequence. Our data reinforce the widely-articulated notion that journalists were caught off guard in 2016. We add to this understanding by unpacking the particular challenges journalists faced, including the way Trump controlled the news cycle, the fact that his “gaffes” had little effect, and the difficulties in correctly capturing public mood among voters (a challenge exacerbated by populism). We conclude that the old rules of the game failed to account for the particulars of 2016 and, perhaps, are no longer applicable for elections moving forward.