From the editor
“This might be the first time as a journalist I’m ever hoping for the boring outcome.” That’s how one politics editor at an online news site described preparations for covering the November 3 presidential election—and the days, weeks, and months to follow.
With the vote just over a week away, Nieman Reports surveyed how national outlets are gearing up for an election night that might last days or even longer; how cable news plans to calibrate coverage if there are no definitive results on the last day of voting; and how newsrooms and nonprofits are teaming up to fight misinformation.
We also asked editors at newsrooms in key swing states to describe how they are covering this intensely contested vote and its aftermath:
With mis- and disinformation campaigns heating up, a vacancy on the Supreme Court that could soon be filled, and a president who refuses to commit to accepting the voting results, our election 2020 coverage—and that of our sister publication Nieman Lab—of how newsrooms are responding to this period of extraordinary uncertainty and tension will continue up to and after the outcome, boring or not, is known.
Sincerely,
James Geary
Editor, Nieman Reports
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