What Social Media Mentions Reveal About Partisan Communication Trends
A look at which platforms members of Congress reference
This weekly insight focuses on which social media platforms members of Congress reference in official e-newsletters to constituents. When writing about social media, legislators ask constituents to “follow” them, check out updates on other platforms, link to their posts, and occasionally address platform-related policy—like in the 118th Congress, when bipartisan majorities passed legislation to ban TikTok.
This analysis tracks the overall attention different platforms receive over time, separated by party. Like nearly everything in the congressional communications world, partisan differences are both consistent and telling.
Facebook and Twitter are the two most frequently mentioned platforms in official congressional e-newsletters. While searching for “X” is not functionally possible, more than 2,000 e-newsletters in the past year still refer to “Twitter.”
Republicans have always outpaced Democrats in the number of official e-newsletters sent (except for during the first part of the COVID-19 pandemic), and that same is true for mentions of Facebook and Twitter. Many of these mentions are of the style of how to access more information about a congressperson.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to DCinbox Insights to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.