On Media Blog Archives Select Date… December, 2015 November, 2015 October, 2015 September, 2015 August, 2015 July, 2015 June, 2015 May, 2015 April, 2015 March, 2015 February, 2015 January, 2015

Despite Bernie Sanders' social media surge, Donald Trump still dominates Twitter and Facebook. | AP Photo Sanders gives Trump a run for his money on social media

Donald Trump may be in for some competition for social media attention. For the first time in weeks, Bernie Sanders had the most popular tweet of the week and had six of the 10 most popular tweets of the week.

But despite Sanders’ Twitter success, Trump stayed Trump on social media, dominating the conversation — from his highs (Sarah Palin's endorsement) to his lows (re-tweeting a neo-Nazi). According to data provided by Twitter, 2.5 million tweets mentioned Trump over the past week, followed by Hillary Clinton with 1.9 million and Bernie Sanders with 1.7 million. The closest Republican to Trump was Ted Cruz, with 858,000 tweets mentioning the Texas senator. The rest of the GOP pack was far behind, led by Sen. Marco Rubio with 214,000 tweets.

In what might come as a surprise to some, former Gov. Martin O’Malley, who has been struggling to gain traction, had more tweets mentioning him (157,000) than Sen. Rand Paul (119,000), Carly Fiorina (41,000), former Gov. Mike Huckabee (36,000), former Sen. Rick Santorum (25,000), Gov. Chris Christie (43,000), Dr. Ben Carson (115,000) or Gov. John Kasich (33,000).

What likely helped O’Malley was the Democratic debate on Sunday night, a rare, and vital, moment for him on the public stage. An O’Malley quote from the debate, pinned to the top of his page, garnered him more than 1,000 likes, easily 10 times more than a typical tweet of his receives.

We cannot keep talking past each other. We are one. We must help each other if we want to succeed. #DemDebate — Martin O'Malley (@MartinOMalley) January 18, 2016

Trump and Sanders had the most interactions with their tweets over the week, according to social media tracking firm Socialbakers: Trump with more than 716,000, and Sanders with more than 673,000. Clinton came in third, with more than 347,000 interactions.

It was Sanders, though, who had the most popular tweet of the week, besting Trump with a dose of his own medicine: A Bernie tweet about how he polls in hypothetical matchups against the Republican candidates had more than 15,000 likes and 8,000 retweets:

The Republicans seem to think they could beat our campaign. They haven’t seen the polls. #GOPDebate pic.twitter.com/XitW9T28Vq — Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) January 15, 2016

Sanders also had six of the 10 most popular tweets of the week, with Trump taking up the other four slots.

Trump’s most popular tweet was about attacks by radical Islamists, which garnered more than 15,000 likes and 7,000 retweets.

More radical Islam attacks today - it never ends! Strengthen the borders, we must be vigilant and smart. No more being politically correct. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 16, 2016

On Facebook, Trump had a whopping 9.2 million people make 34.5 million interactions (likes, shares, and comments) about him in the past week. Clinton had 5.4 million people making 21.3 million interactions about her, followed by Sanders with 4 million people making 16 million interactions about him, and Cruz with 2.3 million people making 10 million interactions about him.

Carson, despite coming in fifth in Facebook conversation level, had the second-most interacted-with page, with more than 2 million shares, comments or likes in the past week. While Trump had eight of the most popular Facebook posts of the week, Carson had the third most popular, a photo of himself holding a sign that says “In God We Trust” in response to a lawsuit trying to get the phrase taken off of the nation’s currency. The post has more than 185,000 likes and 21,700 shares.

Liberal progressives in Ohio have filed a lawsuit attempting to remove "In God We Trust" from our nation's currency. I... Posted by Dr. Ben Carson on Monday, January 18, 2016

Trump’s Facebook post about receiving the endorsement from “Duck Dynasty” star Willie Robertson had more than 227,000 likes:

I am truly honored to receive Willie Robertson's endorsement tonight! He is a great person, has had tremendous success... Posted by Donald J. Trump on Thursday, January 21, 2016

But along with re-tweeting a neo-Nazi, Trump also used footage of Russian veterans instead of American vets in a video he made for Facebook on Friday vowing to reform the Veterans’ Administration. The original video was replaced with a new version that excluded the Russian footage a few hours later.

A look at Google searches in Iowa ahead of the states' caucus on Feb. 1 shows some illuminating data on what potential caucus-goers might be thinking. Google search volume for the past week showed Sanders with 50 percent of search volume, Clinton with 44 percent and O’Malley with six percent, according to Patrick Ruffini of the analytics firm Echelon Inisights. Among Republicans, Trump was the subject of 40 percent of Google searches in Iowa for the past week, followed by Cruz with 17 percent, Rubio with 14 percent and Carson with 9 percent.

Sanders also had the digital adverstising win of the week — he released an ad that doubles as a minute-long tribute to his supporters. The candidate himself doesn’t speak until he “approves this message” at the end of the ad — the rest of the sound comes from Simon and Garfunkel’s “America,” which plays over clips of Americana, families, and farmers, and shots of thousands of cheering and celebrating Sanders fans. The ad had more than one million YouTube views in just 24 hours after the Sanders campaign posted it Thursday.

Scott Bland contributed.