Political posts
Political posts have the ability to divide people, and opinion, like nothing else. Even this year, with what I would consider fair, accurate, and balanced coverage, we had multiple incidents where viewers attacked our journalistic integrity. Given these and the propensity for misinformation to be spread in political arenas, the most important thing for me is objectivity. I try to synthesize things down to just the facts, leaving any political bias at the door, and thus giving our audience the most equitable media coverage possible.
Athens Campaign Stop Fact-checks
Caption: Republican speakers with the Team Trump Bus Tour made several claims regarding the state of the nation to a crowd of supporters gathered off Milledge Avenue on Oct. 4. Editor-in-Chief Wyatt Meyer, who attended the event, fact-checked statements speakers made. Photos, graphics, and story by Wyatt Meyer
Stay tuned for more coverage of the 2024 presidential election in the coming weeks.
Caption: Speakers at the “Get Out the Vote with Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff” event made several claims regarding the state of the nation to a crowd of supporters at event space 1055 Barber on Oct. 10. Editor-in-Chief Wyatt Meyer, who attended the event, fact-checked statements speakers made. Photos, graphics and story by Wyatt Meyer
Stay tuned for more coverage of the 2024 elections in the coming weeks.
I took the idea for this post from The Washington Post and websites like FactCheck.org, who aimed to keep those in power accountable. For each political event held in Athens that I attended, I recorded all spoken statements, then combed through each of them for claims that could be substantiated. I chose six from each candidate, choosing the specific claims based on three factors: the weight/gravity of the claim, the information I had to confirm/refute it, and whether it was representative of the overall truth of their statements. To keep readers engaged, I paired every claim with a photo of the speaker, while letting the subsequent fact-check slide shine through with no image, just a spot color and explanation. These posts were very time-consuming, though rewarding: I enjoyed working on them because I knew they would serve our community more than simply an event recap. To me, this is the best example of localizing national news in a way that positively impacts our audience.
Trump named President
Caption: Donald Trump is projected to win the presidency of the United States for the second time. Trump swept the key battleground states of North Carolina, Georgia and Pennsylvania on Election Night, sealing a second term in office. Graphic by Wyatt Meyer
Waking up on the morning after the election to find it called, we decided this would be one of the rare times we posted national news without localizing it. The post was simple, complete with one dominant photo and a straightforward caption with no room for interpreted bias. In posting, we hoped to break news to some students who might not otherwise see it from a credible source. I made the decision to disable comments based on previous blowback on political content we’d posted.
Kalki named District Attorney
Caption: Defense attorney Kalki Yalamanchili has been elected the next Western Judicial Circuit District Attorney. Yalamanchili, an independent, will replace incumbent DA Deborah Gonzalez, a Democrat, after winning a majority of votes in both Athens-Clarke County and Oconee County, which make up the Western Judicial District. Graphic and story by Wyatt Meyer
Just after Donalt Trump was named president, the hotly-debated and contested Athens District Attorney election was called in favor of the challenger, Kalki Yalamanchili. I felt better about posting this one, considering we had photos of Yalamanchili and were serving our community explicitly: nobody else had posted a call of the race yet. The timing paid off: I’ll never forget seeing someone repost the call on their story with the caption “Tell me why my 40-year-old brother is getting his news from our high school’s magazine?” That, to me, is positively impacting our community.
Trump involved in shooting
Caption: Former U.S. President Donald Trump was tackled by Secret Service amid loud bangs minutes ago at a Butler, Pennsylvania rally. According to CNN, Trump is currently safe and inside a vehicle.
This is a developing story. Follow reputable news outlets like the Associated Press and The New York Times for updated coverage.
Again, this was a post of such national prominence that my adviser and I felt we had to report on it. We debuted our new Breaking News template for this post, since no fair use image had been released yet, and the black-and-white background allowed us to write out the distressing headline. We posted this after national news had broken the story, but still early enough that we were doing a service for our audience.
ICYMI: Trump, Harris campaigns come to Athens
Caption: U.S. Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff (left) and Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa (right) are shown on the campaign trail. Ernst, speaking on behalf of former President Donald Trump, and Emhoff, speaking on behalf of his wife, Vice President Kamala Harris, visited Athens within the space of a week to get out votes for their respective candidates. “This is the first election I’m voting in, and this is the first election that excites me,” University of Georgia student Sydney Palmer stated during her speech at Vice President Harris’s campaign event. Photos and graphics by Wyatt Meyer
Check out Meyer’s full story on the ODYSSEY website or at the link in bio!
This post was partially done to increase hype for the election package we were releasing later that day, so in a sense, it was lemonade. However, borrowing from what outlets like The New York Times and The New Yorker were doing in anticipation of the election, we recapped our own (admittedly smaller selection of) favorite political photos. I captioned each one with a short blurb, choosing the photos with the most symbolism, rather than the best shots. The caption was brief and without a quote, but for a post dedicated to highlighting a package coming readers’ way and communicating the most representative political moments, the post did the job.