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Off-year elections are like Rorschach tests, and strategists inside news organizations know it. People can see what they want to see — or what the person presenting the images guides them to see.
This offers the media a big chance to manipulate you. It focuses on certain races and draws sweeping, false conclusions about the “U.S. electorate.” In reality, these races are overwhelmingly driven by local issues and have especially low turnout, even by America’s standards.
I’ll be keeping an eye on the coverage, and ready to correct it.
Even before the elections take place, news agencies often have op-eds ready to run, telling you what the “results” mean. Yes, really. And the people who write these very often have proven track records of being very wrong. Take the notorious liar Peter Beinart, whose New York Times op-ed after the 2024 elections was demonstrably false.
Today would be a great time to listen back to and share this episode covering how the media got so much wrong in its 2024 election coverage.
Mamdan-gerous
The election getting the most national attention is the mayoral race in New York City, which speaks to both political and geographic bias.
Despite his vow to take authoritarian, anti-democratic action; long record of antisemitic bigotry and “love” for terror funders, Zohran Mamdani is expected to win. This is due in large part to the media, which has radicalized left-wing voters with a daily onslaught of lies and actively run cover for him.
Learn more in the latest episode:
Here’s a powerful, numerical example. showing the media’s double standard. About 15% of Black voters supported Trump last year, according to a Pew Research analysis. In the latest Quinnipac poll, about the same percentage (16%) of Jewish NYC voters support Mamdani.
But the New York Times has filled its pages with pro-Mamdani madness, including an op-ed saying “plenty of Jews” support him. The Times has never said this about Black voters supporting Trump.
If Mamdani wins as expected, news agencies will probably bring people in to argue that the Democratic Party should follow his lead. But in reality, this race does not reflect America. And mayoral elections in NYC don’t even involve the majority of local voters. The last mayoral race there had only 23% turnout.
Meanwhile, nationally, voters showed last year that they considered Kamala Harris too far left. Mamdani is so much further out she’d need binoculars just to spot him. Hear how she recently sidestepped Rachel Maddow’s question about endorsing him, in Episode 76.
For the media, tomorrow’s coverage is an opportunity to determine whether they’ve learned anything over the past year. Will they provide the necessary caveats to explain why individual odd-year local races don’t predict the future, or will they stick to their tried-and-true failure?
It’s one year to go until the Midterms, which generally do reflect the national state of the electorate. Americans need news they can trust. That starts with showing legacy media that they stand corrected.
Programming note: This week’s episode will be one day later than usual so I can provide initial analysis of election coverage. Look for it Thursday morning, wherever you listen.
Supporters: Share your thoughts, ideas, and questions in the comments or by messaging me here on Substack. I aim to incorporate all of them. Founding Members: Send the reports that bother you the most — I aim to lead with those.