I believed in traditional reporting, but Trump changed me — and it should change the rest of the media too.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
...American democracy is now on the edge of a precipice. What can members of the press do to help keep it from tipping over as the 2024 campaign looms? What should we have learned since that summer in 2016?
For one thing, I’m convinced that journalists — specifically those who cover politics — must keep a sharp focus on truth-seeking, not old-style performative neutrality. Does that mean we throw objectivity out the window? Of course not. We should be resolutely objective in the sense of seeking evidence and approaching subjects with an open mind. We should not, however, resort to taking everything down the middle, no matter what. Rather than, for example, having equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats (or conservatives and progressives) on every talk show, or devoting equal numbers of words to each side of a political argument, we should be thinking about what coverage serves the public best.
Those who deny the outcome of the 2020 election certainly don’t deserve a media megaphone for that enduring lie, one that is likely to reemerge in the presidential campaign ahead. But the media should go one step further: When covering such a politician in other contexts — for example, about abortion rights or gun control — journalists should remind audiences that this public figure is an election denier.
That’s exactly the model pursued by WITF, a public radio station in Harrisburg, Pa., which decided to remind its audience on a regular basis that some Republican state legislators and members of the Pennsylvania congressional delegation had opposed the transfer of power to Joe Biden, despite the lack of evidence to support their claims of election fraud. A story on the station’s website about a state legislator’s efforts to get Pennsylvanians vaccinated was accompanied by a sidebar of text about his behavior after the election. On-air stories have used a tagline to accomplish the same purpose. The decision wasn’t easy , one editor told me, “because this is not the normal thing.”
Media people — not just reporters but their editors and top leaders of newsrooms — also need to take a hard, critical look at the types of stories that constitute traditional campaign coverage. That coverage has historically leaned on such things as live footage of speeches, rallies and debates; on “horse race” articles based on polls or conventional wisdom; and on blowing up small conflicts (campaign staff in disarray!) into major stories. These modes of coverage can have the effect of normalizing a candidate who should not be normalized. They also often constitute a distraction at a time when huge swaths of one party are essentially running against democratic practices.
By no means am I counseling that journalists act as if they are “on the team” of Trump’s rivals. That’s not our job. At the same time, we have to be aware that covering someone who doesn’t care about democratic norms — even something as basic as the peaceful transfer of power — requires different judgments about what stories really matter, and how we should or should not cover them.
In making these judgments, we have to relentlessly explain ourselves to our readers, viewers and listeners. Although it didn’t involve Trump, a good example of this came over the summer when the Plain Dealer newspaper in Cleveland decided against covering a rally for U.S. Senate candidate J.D. Vance featuring Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis because of the absurdly restrictive rules the campaign had tried to impose, including a prohibition against interviewing attendees who weren’t approved by rally organizers. Instead, the Plain Dealer published white space, with a note to readers written by editor Chris Quinn headlined, “We reject the free speech-trampling rules set by J.D. Vance and Ron DeSantis for covering their rally.” Quinn was blunt: “Think about what they were doing here. They were staging an event to rally people to vote for Vance while instituting the kinds of policies you’d see in a fascist regime.”
Of course, the press must be just as tough on Democrats, should they adopt similar tactics or start lying all the time or trashing governmental norms. The standards should be the same for all. But journalists shouldn’t shy away from the unavoidable truth: Most of this is coming from Trump-style Republicans.
Perhaps the most important thing journalists can do as they cover the campaign ahead is to provide thoughtful framing and context. They shouldn’t just repeat what’s being said, but help explain what it means. This is especially important in headlines and news alerts, which are about as far as many news consumers get. When Trump rants about the supposed horrors of rigged elections and voting fraud, journalists have to constantly provide the counterweight of truth. We have gotten better at this since 2016. Now we have to stick to it.
All of these suggestions go against the grain of traditional politics coverage. Undoubtedly, this approach will draw accusations of bias from the right; undoubtedly, journalists and news leaders will be put on the defensive. They’ll need to get over that. The stakes are enormously high. Doing things the same old way isn’t remotely appropriate. By now, that’s something we all should have learned.
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Finally, someone in the media that gets it. Too bad its 6 years too late.
When interviewing Trump it's best to bring a coloring book and a sharpie.