There are a lot of reasons why many newsrooms are embracing a different approach to election coverage these days. First, of course, the fact that most media outlets were blindsided by Donald Trump’s win in 2016, which showed how newsrooms didn’t have a finger on the pulse of middle America. Newsrooms that were caught flat-footed were left asking —”where did that come from?”

Then, there’s the more recent ominous drum beating of threats to democracy in the wake of January 6th, and the rise of partisan election officials in many states who vow to contest election results they disagree with. Finally, with vast amounts of mis- and disinformation circling, voters don’t know whom they trust. And these days, it is rarely their local public media station or newspaper.

So no wonder we are looking at a widespread election coverage re-boot; a re-boot that refocuses attention on voters and their information needs. Here are some resources to share with your newsroom, or just to spark new thinking when it comes to political journalism.

Trainings:

Democracy SOS: Hearken has teamed up with the Solutions Journalism Network to train newsrooms across the country on how to transform political coverage with the explicit aim of strengthening democracy. They are incorporating elements of the Citizen’s Agenda, which centers voters in the reporting process (rather than politicians), along with resources from Election SOS, a project developed in 2020. The newsrooms involved in this project are trained to experiment with new ways to work with and for the communities they serve. 

American Press Institute’s Election Coverage and Community Listening Fund: API will be awarding small grants (deadline August 17, 2022) to newsrooms that want to prioritize community listening as a foundation for their political coverage. The goal is to help newsrooms help their communities make informed choices when it comes to the upcoming midterms, and ultimately in 2024.

America Amplified Elections 2022: With funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, America Amplified is working with 29 stations across 25 states to engage audiences and communities and provide them with the information they need to participate in the upcoming midterms. The initiative provides tools that will allow people to submit election-related questions to their local public media station. Questions will be answered using nonpartisan election information sources, and will be distributed to communities through a wide variety of platforms. 

Coverage:

1A Remaking America: A nationally broadcast midday talk show, produced at WAMU in Washington D.C., 1A is launching a new two-year reporting project addressing the erosion of trust in our institutions, from politics, to health, to the media. Through a series of nationwide conversations, citizen spotlights, live events and explainer journalism, they will explore how to overcome the partisan divide that threatens our country’s democratic experiment. Remaking America is also funded by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. 

Votebeat: Votebeat is an offshoot of Chartbeat, a non-profit newsroom that covers local education issues in 8 states. Votebeat builds on that local news model with a non-partisan coverage of election integrity and administration for the midterms in five key states: Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Texas. This pop-up election newsroom’s mission is to help people understand democracy so they can participate in strengthening it. Like America Amplified, their approach is to cover and explain the mechanics of voting — no candidates, no issues, no Election Day results. Their stories are available to all local and national news outlets at no cost. 

Establishing New Beats

Many newsrooms have responded to this time by creating new beats focused specifically on supporting democracy and civic participation. Here are just a few examples — if there are more, we’d like to know!

The Washington Post (their motto: Democracy dies in darkness): formed a new Democracy Team with two editors and three reporters

Spotlight PA: a nonpartisan newsroom covering Pennsylvania’s state government — launched a local journalism equivalent of the Post’s effort — a Democracy Initiative to provide voters with the information they need on campaigns, candidates and voting.

WITF in Harrisburg, PA: established a new Democracy Beat this year and have hired a reporter specifically focused on debunking disinformation. WITF also implemented what they call an ‘accountability policy’ that links state and federal elected officials with their actions supporting then-President Trump’s lies about election fraud. Every story they air or publish that quotes a state lawmaker who signed on to efforts to overturn the vote in Pennsylvania includes a line drawing the connection between that lawmaker and the election fraud lie.

KPCC and LAist: created a Civics and Democracy beat to focus attention on voters’ issues. The beat focuses on what is eroding the underpinnings of our democratic processes and raises up the voices of voters.