The Online Confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson
Ahead of Monday’s hearing, Biden’s SCOTUS nomination so far fails to energize Americans online. That’s probably a good thing.
We are in the midst of a historic moment in American politics, with confirmation hearings set to begin on Monday for Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, who would become the first black woman on the Supreme Court. Supreme Court nomination fights are typically political slugfests, with dark money groups on both sides organizing and advertising to support or oppose the nominee. KBJ’s nomination, however, is a bit different.
Social media posts about her nomination are receiving below-average engagement, and right-wing political ad campaigns have yet failed to materialize online. For her chances of confirmation, that’s probably a good thing. In this week’s FWIW, we’ll break down how Judge Jackson’s nomination is playing out across the internet.
But first…
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By the numbers:
FWIW, here were the top-spending political advertisers on Meta platforms (Facebook + Instagram) last week:
While national spending data hasn’t changed much over the past few weeks, looking at Facebook and Instagram spending in a few midterm battleground states reveals some interesting new trends.
First, the top Facebook spender in Michigan was a page called the Main Street Sentinel. The group, which has disclosed ties to at least 9 other progressive political pages in the state, is pushing lots of content about Biden administration accomplishments and Gov. Whitmer’s agenda. 👏 While the Main Street Sentinel page is new, its other affiliated pages like “A Working Michigan” and “Stand up 4 Michigan’s Middle Class” ran ads in the 2020 cycle.
Second, in Georgia, liberal outside group Priorities USA was the top spender statewide last week, spending big via a page called “Our Power Is Us” to attack Gov. Brian Kemp and his Trump-backed primary challenger David Perdue.
Also advertising on Meta platforms is Run for Something Action Fund, which has been running lots of new Facebook + Instagram ads recruiting young people to run for local offices like County Clerk. Their ads use clever short vertical videos and just the right amount of profanity to get millennials to stop scrolling and start considering public service.
Meanwhile, here were the top-spending political advertisers on Google platforms last week, including YouTube:
Similar to Facebook, nationwide Google and YouTube political ad spending mostly remained unchanged since last week. One exception is a new campaign from the liberal group American Bridge, which attempts to boost President Biden among swing-state voters in western Pennsylvania and northeast Georgia.
Lastly, here are the top political ad spenders on Snapchat so far this year:
Midterm spending takeaways
The midterms are here, and we’ve been keeping a close eye on digital ad spending in key Senate, House, and Gubernatorial contests. For full access to the most comprehensive dataset of midterm digital spending, become a paying subscriber here. >>
Raphael Warnock was the top-spending battleground Senate candidate on FB + Google ads last week (view Senate data).
Stacey Abrams was the top spending battleground Gubernatorial candidate on digital ads last week (view Gov data).
OR-6 was the most expensive swing U.S. House district race online last week (view House data).
Q&A on building political technology
For this week’s Campaigner newsletter, we spoke with NGP VAN’s outgoing President Amanda Coulombe on her 14 years of building political campaign technology. Amanda reflects on how the political tech ecosystem has changed over the years, why it’s important to listen to users when building products, and what she sees as the most important channels for reaching voters in 2022. Read + subscribe >>
The online confirmation of Ketanji Brown Jackson
Monday marks the beginning of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s (KBJ) historic confirmation hearings to become an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court. Our research found that social media posts about her nomination are receiving below-average engagement, and right-wing political ad campaigns have yet failed to materialize online. For supporters of Judge Jackson, that lack of viral controversy is probably a welcome relief.
Google search interest 📈
When President Biden made Judge Jackson’s nomination official on February 25th, Google search interest for her spiked. Just days later, that interest immediately waned - likely due to a combination of factors, the largest being the media’s wall-to-wall coverage of the Ukraine crisis. Google search interest around the same pre-confirmation time periods of Justices Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett was steadily higher.
Facebook engagement 👍
When Judge Jackson’s nomination was initially announced, the news was well-received on Facebook. The top posts mentioning ‘Ketanji Brown Jackson’ in the past 30 days came from Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and President Joe Biden’s Facebook pages, each gaining over 70,000 interactions, which is probably a little below average for a top post from one of these high-audience pages.
Out of the top 25 performing posts mentioning Ketanji Brown Jackson on Facebook in the past 30 days, not one was negative. Similar to Google Search interest, the majority of top-performing posts mentioning Judge Jackson were shared around the news of her initial confirmation, and most content (positive and negative) since February 25th has failed to take off.
Right-wing media 📺
That lack of negative engagement around Judge Jackson’s nomination on Facebook could be partially attributed to a lower than average interest from right-wing online media like Breitbart, the Daily Wire, and others. Those outlets seem to have tested several lines of attack, which have generally failed to catch fire.
Here’s what we’ve seen so far: Breitbart and FOX initially tried to push the idea that Judge Jackson wasn’t qualified, questioning her LSAT score. Then, they attempted to hit her record on immigration, decrying that she wouldn’t use the term “illegal alien.” They then generally attempted to tie her to radical people and ideas, and their most recent line of attack we’re certain to see in Monday’s hearing is on criminal defense. Here’s a write-up in POLITICO from this week on Senate Republicans’ strategy to push the narrative that Judge Jackson is weak on crime.
Raising grassroots money 💰
At least in DC, liberal groups are energized and excited to put the first black woman justice on the court. Democratic campaigns and organizations have taken advantage of KBJ’s nomination to excite their base and attempt to raise grassroots dollars. We’ve counted at least 30 liberal organizations or Democratic campaigns running Facebook ads supportive of her nomination. It’s rare that so many groups jump on the exact same issue for fundraising ads - and much of the creative is very similar.
Despite the major online ad spending from liberal groups supportive of her nomination, ad campaigns online to oppose KBJ have yet to materialize. We’ve only seen a few conservative advertisers running digital ads in opposition. Most notably: The Trump Campaign [which as a reminder, is not banned from Facebook], the NRSC, Advancing American Freedom, Rand Paul, the Republican National Committee, and Catholic Vote. We do not estimate that these groups are spending significant dollars on these ads, which are also for grassroots fundraising- not persuading swing voters:
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