Texas state senator Wendy Davis received more than three times the amount of network-news coverage than the airtime given to the entire trial of abortionist Kermit Gosnell, according to a report from the Media Research Center’s Culture and Media Institute.
In the 19 days following her eleven-hour filibuster against an abortion-restriction bill on June 25, the Texas state senator was featured on ABC, NBC, and CBS programs for a total of 40 minutes, 48 seconds. The 59-day trial of Gosnell received only 13 minutes, 30 seconds of coverage on the same networks.
Gosnell was convicted on three counts of murder for killing three infants who had been born alive, and one count of involuntary manslaughter in the death of one of his female patients. As Americans learned of his appalling, unsanitary, and brutal practices, his Philadelphia clinic was called a “house of horrors” and a “slaughterhouse.” Wendy Davis and her pink sneakers, meanwhile, became a media sensation for her filibuster defense of the right to abortions after 20 weeks and opposition to regulations on Texas abortion clinics.