Latest from Next TV in 2016-elections

Political Ad Spending to Hit $6B in 2016: Analyst

jon.lafayette@futurenet.com (Jon Lafayette) — Tue, 17 Nov 2015 15:00:00 +0000

The 2016 elections could generate $6 billion in election-year ad spending, with 66%, or $4 billion going to television, according to a new report from a Wall Street analyst.

Marci Ryvicker of Wells Fargo forecast that digital will increase its share of political spending, but its gain will not come at the expense of television.

Digital’s share should go to about 11%, or $650 million, in 2016 from 6% in 2012, Ryvicker said. Most of those funds will come from budgets previously assigned to print.

“While every candidate will likely have a digital presence, presence is free -- don't confuse ‘interactions’ with ‘ad spend,’” Ryvicker said in her report.

Fox News Sets GOP Debate Roster

thomas.umstead@futurenet.com (R. Thomas Umstead) — Tue, 04 Aug 2015 22:45:00 +0000

Fox News Tuesday released the roster for its prime-time Republican presidential debate, with Donald Trump as the front-runner heading into Thursday night's eagerly-awaited event.

Trump will be joined by Gov. Jeb Bush; Gov. Scott Walker; Gov. Mike Huckabee, neurosurgeon Ben Carson, Sen. Ted Cruz, Sen. Marco Rubio, Sen. Rand Paul, Gov. Chris Christie and Ohio Gov. John Kasich on the stage for the debate, which will air live on Fox News.

Not making the cut, but who will be invited to appear at a forum the same day, were Gov. Rick Perry, Sen. Rick Santorum, Gov. Bobby Jindal, former HP chief Carly Fiorina, Sen. Lindsey Graham, Gov. George Pataki and Gov. Jim Gilmore.

The rosters were determined based on an average of the five most recent national polls, from Bloomberg, CBS News, Fox News, Monmouth University and Quinnipiac University.

John Eggerton contributed to this story.

Fox News Makes Room for All GOP Debaters

john.eggerton@futurenet.com (John Eggerton) — Wed, 29 Jul 2015 14:45:00 +0000

Fox News is adjusting its coverage and hosting of the first Republican presidential debate to accommodate the historically large field of candidates, which could be 17 by the Aug. 6 debate date.

Fox and Facebook are teaming on that primetime debate for the top 10 polling candidates, but Fox is also providing an "undercard" debate -- preceding the main event -- featuring the balance of the candidates.

Just yesterday, Fox relaxed its requirement for participation in that second (chronologically first) debate among the non-top 10 pollers to make sure all the candidates had a forum. Initially, it was requiring polling at least 1%.

Fox News at first planned to air the "undercard debate" in the afternoon of Aug. 6 between 1 and 3 p.m., but later decided to move it to 5-6 p.m. to have it be closer to the primetime debate -- making it more of a debate event package -- and as a lead-in to Special Report with Bret Baier.

Fox will also use some video from the early debate in the main event coverage, so those second-tier candidates will get primetime exposure.

“As we noted when we first announced the debate criteria, our intention has always been to provide coverage to the wide field of Republican candidates," Fox News EVP Michael Clemente said when announcing the second debate.

The pre-debate debate will be hosted by Bill Hemmer and Martha MacCallum.