Rubio: Let's face it, Spanish-language TV is in the tank for ObamaCare

He’s not breaking any news here but I think this topic has so far largely escaped the conservative radar screen and that needs to change. Spanish-language TV, i.e. Telemundo and Univision, is bigger than ever and on track to get bigger still. Univision beat the four major broadcast networks in primetime during July sweeps last year among the key 18-to-49 demographic. They also launched Fusion TV, an English-language network aimed at younger Americans, including/especially Americans of Latino descent. According to Forbes, Univision reaches 97 percent of Latino households in the U.S., valuable influence given growth projections for the Latino population. And, oh, by the way, according to a study produced by the MRC’s new Spanish-language chapter, MRC Latino, both Univision and Telemundo are as reliably liberal as English-language American media. In some ways, more so:

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Out of 667 stories on U.S. domestic policy, more than six times as many tilted left/liberal (300 or 45%) as slanted in a right/conservative direction (43, or 6%). The remaining 324 stories (49%) presented a balanced or neutral discussion of U.S. policy.

Overall, Democratic politicians, led by President Obama, Obama administration officials and congressional Democrats, along with spokespeople for left-leaning advocacy organizations, were quoted nearly three times as often as their Republican and conservative counterparts (1,011 to 370 appearances and/or direct quotations).

The top three U.S. domestic policy topics covered by Univision and Telemundo newscasts were immigration law enforcement, immigration reform legislation in Congress and ObamaCare. The majority (170, or 59%) of Univision and Telemundo’s 288 stories on these three issues tilted left/liberal. Only 21 stories (7%) tilted towards the right/conservative.

Despite ObamaCare’s problem-plagued rollout and controversial implementation, Univision and Telemundo reporting featured advocates of ObamaCare over its conservative opponents by a margin of nearly five-to-one (116-24).

None of the Obama administration’s various scandals (the IRS targeting of conservative groups; Benghazi; etc.) were even once mentioned during this four-month study.

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Hard to make headway among a group you’ve struggled with if the other party’s sins are being blacked out. Where this moves from routine liberal bias into something more is, as Rubio notes, with respect to ObamaCare. BuzzFeed wrote about that recently. Is Univision a media outlet or is it an advocacy group?

For more than a year, the Spanish-language television network Univision has embarked on their own company-wide effort to get Latinos signed up on the exchanges, working through newscasts, special programming, advertising partnerships, and a dedicated health care website.

Univision has not only been providing information to their viewers as to how to sign up but openly encouraging them to do so…

A main goal for Univision, Keppel said, has been reiterating that signing up for the ACA would not require giving immigration information to the government.

The chairman of Univision is billionaire liberal and Clinton crony Haim Saban, who says seeing Hillary become president is a “dream” of his. Univision recently entered into a formal partnership with Hillary to promote children’s health, a relationship that drew criticism from English-language media as a potential conflict of interest for the network ahead of the 2016 election. That is to say, even the ol’ liberal media thinks Spanish-language media is in the tank for the left in some ways. How much will comprehensive immigration reform — which, I remind you, will be passed with mostly Democratic support even if Boehner acquiesces in it — undo this very blue filter on the “news” that Spanish-speaking voters are getting?

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GOP leaders will conclude from this that they need to make prominent Republicans much more freely available to Spanish-language media. Fair enough; if the conservative viewpoint isn’t being aired at all, one way to correct that is to borrow some of their air time for conservative guests. You’re kidding yourself, though, if you think it’s going to move the needle appreciably given the extent of the bias documented by MRC. You could book Republicans onto Rachel Maddow’s show every night in the name of representing the party’s viewpoint; if Univision is as determined as Maddow is to present a liberal point of view, it won’t make a whit of difference to audience perceptions. And given who their chairman is, it’s a safe bet that they are that determined.

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