The US Presidential Election Coverage, BBC, Sky News, Fox News, CNN, LBC, Times RadioUS Presidential elections are a source of fascination for a comparatively small number of UK political observers. Yet the resources put into covering them by all the major broadcasters are massive and totally out of proportion to the number of viewers their election night programmes will attract.
I cannot claim to have watched all the output of the UK or US news networks, mainly because I was presenting LBC’s election night coverage. However, I had two TV screens in front of me during our seven-hour long show (CNN and Sky, since you ask), and I have watched a lot of the subsequent BBC, Sky and CNN output.
CNN had amazing graphics, but they tended to bamboozle with rapid fire statistics, which didn’t stay on screen long enough for the viewer to digest them properly. Sky’s were much clearer and comprehensible. Fox News’ election night coverage is often unrivalled, both visually and in terms of commentary. From what I have seen, this week has been no different. Out goes the right-wing slant, in comes the best analysis and the best graphics. They incurred the wrath of the Trump campaign by calling Arizona for Biden, which led to an angry phone-call between Trump and Rupert Murdoch, in which the latter allegedly put the phone down on the former.
