Dominating the Messaging as Presidential Power: Trump and the ‘Perfect Phone Call’

Impeachments are rare in the U.S.'s nearly 250 years of history, and none of the three presidents to have faced it were removed from office. Donald Trump’s first impeachment was special since the Twitter-president had a voice in it, albeit indirectly. But he won the battle of interpretation, the Republicans followed the lead, and the ideological media signed on. Trump not only transformed the party and de-institutionalized it. He also gained presidential power through his style of communication. Dominating the messaging became one of the most important features of presidential power and Trump certainly led a constant fight of interpretive primacy with the media during his presidency. Still, there is considerable contention revolving around what Gans (1980) termed the ‘tango’ between journalists and politicians: the question which one is the primary force in agenda-setting and news-framing? This is all the more important, since new platforms such as social media, blogs and ideological media gained traction in recent years. Since much attention has been paid to social media (see for instance Trottier & Fuchs 2017; Spohr 2017; Harris & Harrigan 2017; Allcott & Gentzkow 2017), this study looks at the ideological media phenomenon as a new channel of communication in the context of the media-politics relationship. Specifically, we examine the relationship between the Republican elites, most importantly the President, and partisan media in the US with a focus on power in terms of interpretational sovereignty and information flow. We chose the media discourse on Trumps impeachment with a focus on the hearings as it represents a recent issue that is bound to be portrayed in strongly ideological terms, and thus makes for a promising topic of study. Specifically, we will look into the following questions: RQ1: To what extent do the frames of Republican elites and ideological media converge during Trump’s impeachment hearings? RQ2: Is the dynamic of framing between political elites and ideological media hierarchical characterized by a top-to-bottom flow of information? RQ3: To what extent is elite dominance over interpretational sovereignty challenged or reinforced by ideological media?