Out of Office and In the News: Early Projections of the Clinton Legacy

During the first year after a president has left office, the tone and topic of news media coverage can influence a legacy greatly. This study examines coverage of Bill Clinton during his first year out of office in the New York Times and on network news shows and compares this coverage to that of Ronald Reagan and George Bush during their first years out of office. We find that Clinton received substantially more news coverage during the first year out of office than did either Reagan or Bush, and that Clinton\u27s coverage in the media was also more critical and negative than the coverage received by either of his predecessors