A visual history of Donald Trump dominating the news cycle

June 16 to Sept. 30, 2015

Trump enters the race

MENTIONS IN TEXT

Clinton

Both

Trump

June 16, 2015

JUNE

Trump announces

candidacy

July 18-19, 2015

JULY

John McCain

statement:

‘He is not a

war hero’

AUGUST

Aug. 7-9, 2015

Post-debate feud

with Megyn Kelly

SEPTEMBER

Sept. 18

Trump doesn’t

correct anti-Muslim

questioner at rally

June 16, 2015

July 18-19, 2015

JULY

Trump announces

candidacy

John McCain

statement:

‘He is not a

war hero’

JUNE

Aug. 7-9, 2015

Post-debate feud

with Megyn Kelly

AUGUST

SEPTEMBER

Sept. 18

Trump doesn’t

correct anti-Muslim

questioner at rally

JUNE

June 16, 2015

Trump announces

candidacy

Aug. 7-9, 2015

July 18-19, 2015

Post-debate feud

with Megyn Kelly

JULY

AUGUST

SEPTEMBER

John McCain

statement:

‘He is not a

war hero’

Sept. 18

Trump doesn’t

correct anti-Muslim

questioner at rally

Trump burst onto the political scene in the most Trump way possible: stealing Jeb Bush’s thunder. Bush, seen then as the most viable Republican candidate, had formally announced his presidential bid a day earlier. In his announcement speech, Trump made the first of what would prove to be many inflammatory statements. “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best,” he said. He went on to say “they’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”

The comment outraged Latino groups, and fact-checkers quickly debunked the idea of a link between Mexican immigrants and above-average crime rates. Univision dropped Trump’s Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants from its air; NBC followed suit. The fallout kept generating headlines for more than a week.

A month later, in front of a 3,000-person crowd of social conservative activists, Trump declared that John McCain is not war hero. The statement was widely condemned — within his own party — and some pundits predicted the end of the business mogul’s campaign, believing he had gone too far. Instead, national polls soon showed him as the GOP front-runner.

Then came the first Republican debate. Irked by a question from Fox News moderator Megyn Kelly, who noted his history of offensive remarks about women, Trump launched into a post-debate Twitter tirade. He said Kelly “really bombed” and retweeted a message calling the “Kelly File” host a bimbo. The next day, in an interview with CNN, Trump heaped more criticism on Kelly: “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.”

Where was Hillary Clinton this whole time? Most high-profile Clinton coverage at this time revolved around a then-nascent email scandal and the upcoming, fourth-and-final Benghazi hearing. On Aug. 18, 2015, she held a news conference to discuss her handling of private emails. By most accounts, it did not go well.

Oct. 1 to Dec. 31, 2015

The year winds down

MENTIONS IN TEXT

Clinton

Both

Trump

OCTOBER

Oct. 7

Clinton opposes TPP,

reversing position

Oct. 22

Nov. 27

Fourth Benghazi

hearing

Trump reacts to questions

surrounding Ben Carson’s

life story

NOVEMBER

Nov. 27

Trump denies mocking

disabled New York

Times reporter

Nov. 14

Iowa Democratic

debate

Dec. 15

Vegas GOP

debate

DECEMBER

Dec. 8

The

Muslim

ban

Dec. 22

Dec. 19

Trump says Clinton

was ‘schlonged’

New Hampshire

Democratic debate

Oct. 7

Nov. 27

Trump reacts to questions

surrounding Ben Carson’s

life story

Clinton opposes TPP,

reversing position

OCTOBER

NOVEMBER

Nov. 27

Trump denies mocking disabled

New York Times reporter

Oct. 22

Nov. 14

Fourth Benghazi

hearing

Iowa Democratic

debate

DECEMBER

Dec. 8

The Muslim ban

Dec. 19

New Hampshire

Democratic debate

Dec. 15

Vegas GOP

debate

Dec. 22

Trump says Clinton

was ‘schlonged’

Oct. 7

Nov. 27

Dec. 8

Trump reacts to questions

surrounding Ben Carson’s

life story

The Muslim ban

Clinton opposes TPP,

reversing position

Dec. 15

Vegas GOP

debate

OCTOBER

NOVEMBER

DECEMBER

Oct. 22

Nov. 14

Nov. 27

Dec. 22

Dec. 19

Fourth Benghazi

hearing

Iowa Democratic

debate

Trump denies mocking disabled

New York Times reporter

Trump says Clinton

was ‘schlonged’

New Hampshire

Democratic debate

In early October, Clinton reversed her position on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, coming out against a signature Obama administration trade deal that she previously supported. That followed a September announcement in which she declared her opposition to the Keystone pipeline after prolonged hedging. Both moves were viewed in the press as shifts to the left, prompted by the surprising strength of her democratic socialist challenger in the Democratic primary, Sen. Bernie Sanders. Later in October, Clinton emerged relatively unscathed from an hours-long Benghazi hearing.

A November terrorist attack in Paris kept the spotlight on Clinton, who debated Sanders in Iowa the next day. But it wasn’t long before Trump’s antics thrust him back onto center stage. At a rally in South Carolina, he mocked a New York Times reporter with a physical disability. In early December, a few days after a mass shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., Trump called for a temporary “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” The proposal earned immediate entry into the pantheon of controversial Trump ideas, alongside the Mexican-funded border wall.

Trump finished the year under scrutiny for language he used to criticize Clinton. First, he said her use of the restroom during a Democratic debate was “too disgusting” to talk about. Then he said that she got “schlonged” by President Obama in the 2008 Democratic primary.

Jan. 1 to March 31, 2016

The primaries begin

MENTIONS IN TEXT

Clinton

Both

Trump

Jan. 2

Trump featured

in terrorist

propaganda video

JANUARY

Jan. 9

Muslim woman kicked

out of Trump rally

Jan. 17

Jan. 28

Jan. 29

South Carolina

Democratic debate

Iowa GOP

debate

Clinton

emails

Feb. 1

Feb. 12

Iowa

caucuses

Democratic

debate

FEBRUARY

Feb. 29

Feb. 23

Feb. 27

David Duke

endorses Trump

Trump wins

Nevada

Clinton wins

South Carolina

March 1

March 11

Trump wins big on

Super Tuesday

Trump cancels

Chicago rally

MARCH

March 30

Video of Trump campaign manager

Corey Lewandowski assaulting reporter

JANUARY

Jan. 2

Trump featured in

terrorist propaganda video

Jan. 9

Muslim woman

kicked out of

Trump rally

Jan. 17

Jan. 28

Jan. 29

South Carolina

Democratic debate

Iowa

GOP debate

Clinton

emails

Feb. 1

Feb. 12

March 1

March 11

Iowa

caucuses

Democratic

debate

Trump wins big on

Super Tuesday

Trump cancels

Chicago rally

FEBRUARY

MARCH

Feb. 29

Feb. 23

Feb. 27

March 30

David Duke

endorses Trump

Trump wins

Nevada

Clinton wins

South Carolina

Video of Trump campaign manager

Corey Lewandowski assaulting reporter

Jan. 9

Feb. 1

Feb. 12

March 1

March 11

Muslim woman kicked

out of Trump rally

Iowa

caucuses

Democratic

debate

Trump wins big on

Super Tuesday

Trump cancels

Chicago rally

JANUARY

FEBRUARY

MARCH

Jan. 2

Trump featured in

terrorist propaganda video

Jan. 17

Jan. 28

Jan. 29

Feb. 29

Feb. 23

Feb. 27

March 30

South Carolina

Democratic debate

Iowa

GOP debate

Clinton

emails

David Duke

endorses Trump

Trump wins

Nevada

Clinton wins

South Carolina

Video of Trump campaign manager

Corey Lewandowski assaulting reporter

The new year rang in with news that Trump had become a terrorist recruiting tool. A propaganda video produced by the Somali-based al-Qaeda affiliate al-Shabab featured footage of Donald Trump calling for a ban on foreign Muslims entering the United States. Trump responded by saying the policies of President Obama and Hillary Clinton were to blame for the rise of the Islamic State. A week later, Rosa Hamid, a Muslim woman silently protesting at a Trump rally, was kicked out of the event after being jeered by the crowd.

Late in January, Clinton actually stole Trump’s thunder for a change — but not in a good way. The day after a Republican debate in Iowa, the State Department said it had determined that top secret information had passed through Clinton's private email server.

Jan. 29, 2015

5:15 a.m.

4:32 p.m.

9:25 p.m.

Coverage of the

Iowa GOP debate,

often mentioning

Trump

State Department

announces Clinton

sent ‘top secret’ material

using her private email

Jan. 29, 2015

2:44 a.m.

5:15 a.m.

10:32 a.m.

1:56 p.m.

4:32 p.m.

7:09 p.m.

9:25 p.m.

Coverage of the Iowa GOP debate,

often mentioning Trump

State Department announces

Clinton sent ‘top secret’ material

using her private email

Jan. 29, 2015

2:44 a.m.

5:15 a.m.

10:32 a.m.

1:56 p.m.

4:32 p.m.

7:09 p.m.

9:25 p.m.

Coverage of the Iowa GOP debate,

often mentioning Trump

State Department announces Clinton sent

‘top secret’ material using her private email

On Feb. 1, Clinton came close to losing the Iowa caucuses but escaped with a narrow victory; Trump finished second to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.). Trump won his primary contest in New Hampshire, but Clinton lost there to Sanders. February also included Sarah Palin’s endorsement of Trump — an irresistible media moment that brought Tina Fey back to “Saturday Night Live.” After Trump won the Nevada caucuses, coverage focused on how Trump had defied conventional wisdom and emerged as the clear favorite to win the GOP nomination.

Late in February and into March, Trump bungled questions about an endorsement by white supremacist David Duke yet seemed to pay no price. He won big on Super Tuesday, and after a long string of victories picked up the endorsement of former rival Ben Carson.

On March 11, Trump canceled a rally in Chicago, citing safety concerns, as supporters and protesters tussled on city streets. The next day, a man broke through a police barricade in Dayton, Ohio, while Trump was speaking.

And in late March, police in Jupiter, Fla., released a video showing then-Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski grabbing a female reporter by the arm.

April 1 to July 20, 2016

Full steam ahead to the convention

MENTIONS IN TEXT

Clinton

Both

Trump

APRIL

April 5

Trump and Clinton

lose Wisconsin

April 19

April 25

New York

primaries

Cruz and Kasich

team up

May 3

May 14

Trump wins Indiana;

Cruz drops out

Trump recordings

MAY

May 25

May 26

Trump clinches

nomination

State Department report

criticizes Clinton email use

June 8

JUNE

Clinton clinches

nomination

June 21

Trump and Clinton

trade a series of blows

July 5

JULY

Announcement by

FBI Director

James B. Comey

July 14

Trump insiders

hint Pence as VP,

with official

selection on

July 15

July 19

Start of the Republican

National Convention

April 5

May 3

May 14

Trump and Clinton

lose Wisconsin

Trump wins Indiana;

Cruz drops out

Trump recordings

APRIL

MAY

April 19

May 25

May 26

April 25

New York

primaries

State Department report

criticizes Clinton email use

Trump clinches

nomination

Cruz and Kasich

team up

July 5

June 8

JULY

JUNE

Announcement by

FBI Director

James B. Comey

Clinton clinches

nomination

July 14

Trump insiders

hint Pence as VP,

with official

selection on

July 15

July 19

Start of the Republican

National Convention

June 21

Trump and Clinton

trade a series of blows

April 5

May 3

May 14

June 8

Trump and Clinton

lose Wisconsin

Trump wins Indiana;

Cruz drops out

Trump recordings

Clinton clinches

nomination

APRIL

MAY

JUNE

April 19

May 25

May 26

June 21

April 25

New York

primaries

State Department report

criticizes Clinton email use

Trump clinches

nomination

Trump and Clinton

trade a series of blows

Cruz and Kasich

team up

July 5

JULY

Announcement by

FBI Director

James B. Comey

July 14

Trump insiders hint

Pence as VP, with official

selection on July 15

July 19

Start of the Republican

National Convention

April began in disappointing fashion for Clinton and Trump, as both suffered defeats in Wisconsin. But big wins in their shared home state of New York restored a sense in the media that a Clinton-Trump matchup in the general election was inevitable.

In a last-gasp effort to deny Trump the nomination, Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich formed an alliance in which Kasich agreed to stop campaigning in Indiana and Cruz pulled out of New Mexico and Oregon. Although Kasich and Cruz were the ones taking action, Trump was the impetus — and the focus of news reports that were ostensibly about his rivals.

The Kasich-Cruz plan failed; Trump won all three states. After losing Indiana, Cruz dropped out of the race. Kasich followed the next day, leaving Trump as the presumptive nominee. On May 26, he crossed the threshold of 1,237 delegates needed to clinch the nomination.

One day earlier, the State Department’s inspector general released a report that was highly critical of Clinton’s email practices. But the key development in the email saga occurred on July 5, when FBI Director James B. Comey slammed Clinton and her staff for being “extremely careless” with classified information but recommended no criminal charges against her.

While Clinton made news with one big controversy heading into summer, Trump grabbed the media’s attention with several smaller ones — ones that never involved the specter of indictment, anyway. He said an American-born federal judge is unable to preside fairly over a civil case involving Trump University because he is Hispanic and therefore has an “inherent conflict of interest.” He feuded publicly with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), a possible Clinton running mate, calling her “Pocahontas” in reference to her claim of Native American heritage. He hailed the Brexit vote in the United Kingdom as a “great thing” and invited comparisons to his own campaign.

Then came Trump’s selection of vice presidential candidate Mike Pence, the governor of Indiana, after weeks of media speculation. Now, of course, his convention is underway, complete with a plagiarism scandal. With Trump’s acceptance speech on tap for Thursday night, his next domination of a news cycle is only hours away.

How we did it

Using the Wayback Machine, we gathered archived versions of the Google News homepage starting when Trump announced his candidacy on June 16, 2015, up until July 20, 2016.

The Wayback Machine is a service of Internet Archive, a San Francisco based non-profit and has been capturing snapshots of the public web for the past 20 years. Google News is a computer-generated news service that pulls content from more than 75,000 publishers in 40 languages spanning more than 40 countries.

The Wayback Machine has archived nearly 13,000 versions of the Google News homepage for the time frame we were focusing on, and of those, we sampled about 5,000. The Wayback Machine archives pages anywhere from multiple times an hour to once every few hours; We sampled our set of archived copies so each capture of the Google News homepage no less than an hour apart from the preceding capture.

After extracting the pages, we analyzed the underlying HTML to classify parts of the page as mentioning Trump, Clinton or both. In all, we looked at 3.5 million elements that contained text, and found that about 60,000 mentioned Trump, about 25,000 mentioned Clinton, and just over 4,000 mentioned both candidates.

After extracting the pages, we programmatically highlighted the blocks of text with a color corresponding to what the block mentioned.

After creating multiple classified snapshots per day, we blended them together to create an average for each day, then arranged them in a calendar form, which is the visual device used throughout this article.