In its July 15 coverage of the Senate Judiciary Committee's “first round” of questioning of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, Fox News devoted 55 minutes to questioning by Republicans while devoting only 30 minutes to Democrats' questioning, despite the fact that Democratic senators who asked questions on the second day of the “first round” outnumbered Republicans six to two. By contrast, MSNBC and CNN devoted more time to the Democrats, but not in proportion to their greater numbers.

Media Matters for America reviewed coverage of the eight Senate Judiciary Committee members who each questioned Sotomayor for 30 minutes in their “first round” of questioning on July 15: Republican Sens. John Cornyn and Tom Coburn, and Democratic Sens. Ben Cardin, Sheldon Whitehouse, Amy Klobuchar, Edward Kaufman, Arlen Specter, and Al Franken.

Fox News covered 11 minutes each of Cardin's and Franken's questioning, eight minutes of Specter's, and none of the questioning by Whitehouse, Klobuchar, and Kaufman. By contrast, Fox covered the entire 30 minutes of Cornyn's questioning period and all but five minutes of Coburn's 30 minutes of questions.