Polling, Partisanship, and Promoting Violence: New Developments in Impression Management From Candidate and Super PAC Advertisements

Abstract

Super PACs have become a pivotal force in U.S. elections, often working in tandem with political campaigns to create cohesive messages in advertisements that serve as a tool for impression management. In previous research, I outlined a series of performance types, impression management techniques used by candidates and Super PACS in the 2012 Republican Primary. Since then, a second Republican Primary occurred, and a more expansive dataset on 2012 was released. In this paper I replicate my past work with the new dataset and compare performance types in advertisements from the 2012 and 2016 primaries. When comparing datasets, the findings were overwhelmingly consistent. At the same time, there were fundamental changes between 2012 and 2016. Notably, the inclusion of a new performance type, “the warrior,” which promotes an eagerness to use physical violence toward non-Americans. This change further indicates the rightward shift in Republican messaging that leans into fascism.