Senate

The GOP Twitter Kings

By Jay Newton-Small | @JNSmall | February 5, 2010 | +

Everyone thinks of Obama-land and the Dems as the rulers of new media after their successful harnessing of facebook and social media networking during the 2008 campaign. Apparently, Congressional Republicans have caught on quick. According to a new Congressional Research Study, House Republicans are responsible for the majority of twitter users and twitter traffic (see graphs on pages 4 & 5). Some fascinating stats:

The data show that 205 Representatives and Senators are registered with Twitter (as of September 30, 2009) and issued a total of 7,078 “tweets” during the data collection period of August and September 2009. With approximately 38% of House Members and 39% of Senators registered with Twitter, Members sent an average of 116 tweets per day collectively. Members’ use of Twitter can be divided into eight categories: position taking, policy, district or state activities, official congressional action, personal, media, campaign activities, and other. The data suggest that the most frequent type of tweets were district or state tweets (24%), followed by policy tweets (23%), media tweets (14%), and position-taking tweets (14%).

[...]

Although more than 80% of those registered were Representatives, registration rates were approximately equal between the chambers, with a slightly higher proportion of Senators (39%) registered than Representatives (38%). Overall, 60% of registered Members were Republican and 40% were Democrats. As shown in Figure 1, approximately half of the Members registered with Twitter were Republican Members of the House of Representatives.

[...]

House Republicans sent approximately 55% of all tweets during the two-month period, while House Democrats sent 24% of all tweets. Senate Republicans sent slightly more tweets (12%) than Senate Democrats (9%). While, in aggregate, a greater number of tweets were sent by Representatives than Senators and by Republicans than Democrats, this is in part because a greater number of Representatives and Republicans were registered for Twitter than Senators and Democrats, respectively. At the individual level, there was somewhat less variation. Among those registered for Twitter, the average Republican Senator sent slightly more tweets (39) than the average Democratic Senator (36) during the time period. The partisan variation was larger in the House. Registered Republican Representatives sent an average of 38 tweets during the time period, while the average number sent by registered Democratic Representatives was 27.

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Related Topics: House, republican, Senate, twitter, 2012 Election, Congress, Democratic Party, Media, Republican Party, Senate

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  • Paul-no not that one

    A congressional trip to Iraq this weekend was supposed to be a secret.

    But the cat’s out of the bag now, thanks to a member of the House Intelligence Committee who broke an embargo via Twitter.

    A delegation led by House Minority Leader John A. Boehner , R-Ohio, arrived in Iraq earlier today, and because of Rep. Peter Hoekstra , R-Mich., the entire world — or at least Twitter.com readers—now know they’re there.

    “Just landed in Baghdad,” messaged Hoekstra, a former chairman of the Intelligence panel and now the ranking member, who is routinely entrusted to keep some of the nation’s most closely guarded secrets.

    Before the delegation left Washington, they were advised to keep the trip to themselves for security reasons. A few media outlets, including Congressional Quarterly, learned about it, but agreed not to disclose anything until the delegation had left Iraq.

    Nobody expected, though, that a lawmaker with such an extensive national security background would be the first to break the silence. And in such a big way.
    .
    And they are so good at it too!

  • http://www.twitter.com/jnsmall Jay Newton-Small

    LoL, PNNTO. Point taken: quantity doesn’t = quality.

  • http://mfpdx.wordpress.com mfpdx

    Hoekstra has opened his big mouth before too. Been trying to recall what he said but all I recall is that it hurt, or was supposed to hurt, Obama.

    What’s a traitor? Rhetorical, I suppose….

  • apr2563

    Not the first time the Rep twits have done this.

  • apr2563

    This is just a Rep twit saying “look at me, look at me”. I am in Baghdad. I’m all growed up. This may endanger others but what the heck.

  • http://mfpdx.wordpress.com mfpdx

    But they aren’t being held accountable at all.

  • allthingsinaname

    Next they will tweet about their tweets, which will leave me in a twitter.

  • bensay

    Twitter strikes be as just about the perfect vehicle for GOP “ideas.” Pretty easy to squeeze “taxes bad jesus good muslims dead” into 140 characters. . . .

  • kevin

    Good point. The Republicans have always been about Bumper Sticker Politics — a few easy words, no real details — and this is the 21st century version of that.

  • constantweader

    It’s probably not that challenging to write “NO” 70 times. Besides, Republicans have nothing else to do but Twitter their fingers.

    The Constant Weader at http://www.RealityChex.com

  • http://fourlegsrgood.wordpress.com fourlegsgood

    Jay, they may be tweeting, but is anyone listening? My stupid senator tweets, and I’d like to tell him, “UR DOING IT WRONG”

    it’s mindless press releases and drivel. I had to block his boring twitter stream.

  • stevebeste

    Let me add some OUTRAGE to this thread. What blockhead decided to spend taxpayer dollars to study the tweeting habits of Congress? Some reporting, please.

  • 3xfire3

    Jay,
    Is this really something of importance on which to report?
    Are there not more important stories out there to cover?

    I noticed that 100% of the posts so far were anti republican.
    I guess that just illustrates that most of the commenters on this site are Liberals and Progressives. No balanced ideas here.

  • http://www.inworldstudios.com jayackroyd

    If you actually read what they write, like whoever writes Boehner’s stream, you very quickly see they don’t understand the medium. And they are full of horse puckey.

  • http://www.inworldstudios.com jayackroyd

    Have you read any of their twitter streams? They really are uniformly awful, IME. While I am no McCaskill fan, there is an authentic voice in her stream. It is a caviling, cowardly voice, but it is authentic.

  • http://www.twitter.com/jnsmall Jay Newton-Small

    I do think it’s worthwhile to report. I find new media’s role in politics and campaigns fascinating and the GOP has really lagged behind on this. Remember Karl Rove’s vaunted lists and how the Dems would never overcome their organization? And yet, they did thanks, in large part, to the internet. Now, Republicans are racing to catch up. At the Tea Party conference they’re learning how to use facebook and twitter and meetup.com. This will be a major factor in the 2010 elections on both sides.
    JNS

  • kevin

    Yeah, that’s an excellent question. This was a waste of time and money.

  • FlownOver

    Is there an AutoTwitter? It would make it a lot easier for certain commenters to circulate their endless ad hominem attacks. They routinely prove they have nothing of substance to offer, so a 140-character limitation is no particular problem.

  • 3xfire3

    Jay,
    If it was such a worthy article I expect it would have gotten a few more posts.
    You did show a little more balance in you articles on the Tea Baggers. Thanks.
    The usual bias of reporters from Time does not add to a health discussion of our political system. You know there is no black or white. Everything is a shade of grey. There are two sides to almost every story and truth usually lies somewhere in between. That’s the reality of life that too many people don’t understand. As a Reporter you should understand this and report both sides of the issues so the public has the information to make intelligent decisions. Not necessarily ones that fit your political views.

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