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work anymore. I think the future of political journalism is centered around people. And people are not objective. Everyone has biases; everyone has their own perspectives on how things work. It’s our job as political journalists to make sure that those perspectives are heard and accurately told and accurately contextualized. SEDDIQ As journalists, we still do a good job, for the most part, of trying to remain objective. At the end of each story, I make sure every single word I’ve written, I can fully stand by it as accurate and fair and truthful. I would say that, to be objective—if I am fully comfort able with what I ran, then I think that I’ve achieved objectivity in that piece.
Covering international elections in American political terms In July, Jair Bolsonaro, the president of Brazil and a far-right firebrand, threatened to cancel the nation’s elections. American outlets compared the situation to Donald Trump’s lies about voter fraud in the United States. But in Brazil, a country with a recent history of dictatorship and a leader whose cronies imprisoned his political rival, the threat to democracy is far more acute.
MERCADO I am a woman of color. And I know that I bring a certain perspective and value to the team. I think about ways that we can cover things in relation to our local communities that maybe my other colleagues won’t necessarily think of. And I think that now we’re seeing more of those conversations take place in newsrooms, and seeing the different perspectives that myself or other people of color on our team bring, and how we can incorporate that into our reporting, objectively. I take objectivity very seriously, especially with my sources. I have a lot of sources in the community of color; I have a lot of sources in BLM. I get questions: “What do you think about this?” or “What do you think about that?” And it’s not my job to tell people how I think about things. It’s my job to tell people how it’s affecting you, or what you think about it. It’s my job to make sure that I don’t cross that line, so that I can continue to do reporting that people can trust in and see as valuable. CLÓ I try to get a variety of opinions. I hate just having one side, because I think that the same way the press serves as a vehicle for public officials to communicate with the public, putting the public’s voice there is also a way of sharing the public’s thoughts with the people who are in charge or making decisions, or legislating. What I sometimes take issue with—just gathering opinions to have different sides—is that a lot of opinions are just sharing hate. I really believe in maximizing truth and minimizing harm. Some thoughts are just so hateful, so why would I give that person a voice?
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MCGRAW There is a greater chumminess between the press corps and a Democratic White House, at least from what I’ve seen with Biden so far. A lot of these people have been in DC for a long time. They know a lot of the reporters. They know how it all operates. I think it’s really important to just acknowledge both sides of the argument, and don’t let your own personal passions get in the way of a story. I think you see that play out far too often, where people let that get in the way of just telling the story and doing their job. It’s not about you. It’s not about what you think, or what you think the right answer is. It’s about telling the news. When you see people really editorialize stuff, it’s frustrating, because you’re alienating a lot of readers that way. They’re looking at it and they’re like, “This comes across like an opinion column.”
