One Impeachment, Two Americas.

• Author: Gyrnbaum, Michael M.

It's no wonder Americans are bitterly divided over President Trump's impeachment. They're getting two entirely different versions of what happened.

For a glimpse at the country's divided political reality, look no further than two television studios on opposite sides of Avenue of the Americas in midtown Manhattan.

From her set inside MSNBC headquarters, Rachel Maddow opened her prime-time coverage of the "Dump, impeachment hearings by calling the A first day's testimony "a double-barreled problem for the president--triple-barreled, maybe." President Hump, she said, had been "caught doing something illegal" at the "direct expense " of the country's national interest."

One block south, from a Fox News studio, Sean Hannity welcomed viewers by declaring "a great day for the United States, for the country, for the president--and a lousy day for the corrupt, do-nothing-for-three-years, radical, extreme, socialist Democrats and their top allies known as the media mob."

These distinctly different visions--delivered simultaneously from skyscrapers roughly 1,000 feet apart--were beamed at the 9 p.m. hour into millions of American living rooms. It was a striking reflection of today's choose-your-own-news media environment and a far cry from the era when Americans experienced major events through the same television lens.

Increasingly, viewers are flocking to opinionated news outlets with irreconcilable differences. Although every major TV station broadcast the Trump impeachment hearings live, Fox News (the channel favored by Hump supporters) and MSNBC (the channel most in sync with liberals) were far and away the most popular.

The Media Divide

Television played a crucial role in framing impressions of the nation's last two impeachment dramas. The Watergate hearings of 1973, now viewed with nostalgia as a moment when Americans could more or less agree on facts, were broadcast in sober tones on PBS and in rotating coverage on ABC, CBS, and NBC.

Bill Clinton's impeachment and Senate trial (1998-99), which focused on a sensational sex scandal, came at a time of expansion for 24-hour cable news. But Americans were still all getting pretty much the same information.

The Trump impeachment comes at a moment when news has never been more fractured in the modern era. Many viewers have come to prefer partisan media venues, and the divide extends beyond cable. Social media--from message threads on Reddit to chatter on Twitter and partisan Facebook groups--allows...