Yes, Sinclair Broadcast Group does cut local news, increase national news and tilt its stations rightward

Critics have claimed that Sinclair — a company with close ties to the Trump Administration and conservative politicians — is pushing its stations away from local coverage and toward a partisan brand of political reporting on national politics. In new research, we find evidence that that appears to be the case. Stations bought by Sinclair reduce coverage of local politics, increase national coverage and move the ideological tone of coverage in a conservative direction relative to other stations operating in the same market. Compared to other stations in the same market, once Sinclair buys a station, that station

1. increases its coverage of national politics by roughly 25 percent,
2. decreases its coverage of local politics by roughly 10 percent,
3. shifts significantly rightward in its coverage’s ideological slant, and
4. loses a very small share of its viewers.

There’s already a dismally low level of knowledge about local politics and voting in local elections. If Sinclair continues to grow and changes its stations’ coverage in the ways we document in our research, citizens may lose their chances to hold elected officials accountable.

[Gregory Martin is an assistant professor of political science at Emory University. Joshua McCrain is a graduate student in political science at Emory University.]