TWNW Special: Surveying Foreign Media Coverage of U.S. Election 2024

MCMAHON:
Welcome to The World Next Week's special U.S. Election 2024 episode. I'm Bob McMahon.

ROBBINS:
And I'm Carla Anne Robbins. Next week, eek, Tuesday, November 5th, the United States will choose a new president, and the world is certainly watching.

MCMAHON:
Today, our episode is dedicated to laying out how newsrooms from around the globe have been covering the election, and how that reflects on public interest. It's October 31st, 2024, Halloween, and time for The World Next Week.

ROBBINS:
Bob, the election is dominating every U.S. news outlet from the constant horse race predictions—and I vow I'm not going to read those stories, but they are an addiction—to the more substantive analyses of how a Harris or Trump presidency will shape the U.S. and the world for the next four years. This is a hugely high stake election for the country, and hugely high stake for the world, but this is also a year of elections around the world, and also, a year of enormous global turmoil from Ukraine to Gaza to Sudan to the South China Sea. So, given all that's going on out there, how much has the foreign press been paying attention to our own upcoming vote?

MCMAHON:
Well, what we've done is we've done a survey—not scientific, but pretty comprehensive nonetheless. And certainly, by all appearances—you and I are kind of news junkies anyway, Carla, and global news junkies—but I think it's safe to assume that this is a widespread phenomenon. And it's because, in this year of elections, the biggest enchilada of them all is the U.S. election. This is the big standard-bearer for all the flaws and hypocrisy and things that we've noted on this podcast and elsewhere. The United States matters, and how it votes matters to the rest of the world.

And, as we'll discuss in this podcast, I think, Carla, certain places, there's a higher intensity interest than others, but it's getting a great deal of interest. I'll just mention anecdotally, obviously, Europe, huge front-and-center interest. This is the transatlantic alliance that Trump has steered it in a different direction, certainly rhetorically, in his first term. He talks transactionally, as has been pointed out repeatedly about U.S. relationships with its allies, asking them to, in the case of NATO, pony up more money for dues and things like that. What he's really talking about is defense spending so they can do their share.

It's gotten a huge amount of interest, because Europeans are at once trying to "Trump proof" their policies, but also, I think, just in the case of Europe, it's really caused some navel-gazing on their own about how they are in a situation where their futures seem to be pegged to another country. There's a quote that's been going around a little bit that I think sums up, both the incredible level of interest and sophistication in Europe and elsewhere about the U.S. elections as well as the dilemma. There was a French Europe minister, Benjamin Haddad, who was quoted on television last week—and this is via Politico Europe—as saying, "Let's get out of collective denial. Europeans must take their own destiny into their hands regardless of who's elected U.S. president. We cannot leave the security of Europe in the hands of voters in Wisconsin every four years." A note of the swing state-

ROBBINS:
Interesting choice of that swing state. Yes.

MCMAHON:
Yes.

ROBBINS:
The French love cheese.

MCMAHON:
Exactly. And I'll just add really quickly, the interest does range from what could be said somewhat ambivalence across Africa, where many are sort of seeing not a huge amount of difference in either candidate in terms of the bottom line for Africa—again, that's a sweeping generalization—to Asia where there's a particular concern about what is the impact on economic matters. And Trump has talked quite a bit and unabashedly about tariffs and beautiful tariffs and raising them, not just on China. In Latin America, where you would imagine, unsurprisingly, you'll see interest in U.S. immigration policy given the huge numbers of people in the Western Hemisphere have come to the U.S., certainly during the Biden administration.

ROBBINS:
We tried to get a count of how many foreign correspondents who have come to the United States. We haven't gotten an answer on that, but-

MCMAHON:
No, I mean, generally speaking, I've seen the estimate of ten to fifteen thousand accredited foreign journalists in the United States in general. That doesn't mean just for the elections, but it stands to reason they're going to be covering the country. If you look at some of the bigger newspapers around the world, again, especially in Europe, and you go to their main homepage of their websites, there are dedicated sections to the U.S. elections that are prominent on those pages, El País, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Germany's Süddeutsche Zeitung, and so forth. So it is an important story, and, like in the U.S., covering U.S. elections, it seems to sell papers or sell ads, there's interest in it and advertisers want to advertise on those high volume coverage. And so, it's a perpetuating cycle, seemingly.

ROBBINS:
We talk to journalists all the time—we tend to hang out with our colleagues—and there's anxiety, there's no question about it. And there's fear that the United States is going to turn inward, and more in some regions than in other regions. And they seem to be asking the same questions we are asking. And high anxiety. And reasonably high sophistication in the conversations that we're having.

MCMAHON:
Yes, very much so, and I'll note on that—we're going to mention some other coverage that caught our attention—but just this week in the Columbia Journalism Review, they interviewed seven correspondents from other countries covering the U.S. elections from places from Poland to China and Singapore and so forth. Really interesting to see their perspectives, what they're looking at and how this all adds up to them. And as you know, the sophistication is in some ways a little bit humbling in terms of the depth of their understanding of the U.S.

But Carla, it's only natural for the press to jump on stories that involve big names like Elon Musk or celebrities like Taylor Swift and Beyoncé who have been named in these campaigning stories going on.

ROBBINS:
An enormous amount of coverage of Elon Musk everywhere, every region. Musk's involvement with Trump is just really drawing an enormous amount of attention.

MCMAHON:
And clearly, this interest has been tremendous. Coverage of campaign events has been consistent, but can you talk a little bit about what foreign coverage has really grabbed your attention?

ROBBINS:
So if I could do needlepoint, which I stipulate, I cannot do, I would make a pillow that says, "Media is a plural noun." And coverage, of course, varies from country to country and from outlet to outlet, and it depends on the interests of the editors, the owners, the reporters, and of course, the readers, viewers and listeners, and in some cases, the censors because some of these news outlets are controlled by their governments. So with that caveat and the caveat you've already given, which is this is completely anecdotal and skewing English language or the language that we ourselves speak, I've been really having an incredibly fun time doing this.

There's certainly the self-interested coverage. What does this mean for us? Stories like in the New Zealand Herald, "Inside Economics: Trump or Harris - What Will the Fallout for New Zealand Look Like?"; "Kamala Harris Versus Donald Trump: Who is Better for Asia?" in the Singapore Straits Times. I'm going to spoil that for you—I was surprised because it's a conservative paper. The answer was Kamala in that because of tariffs, of course, and because the fear that they're going to be forced to take sides in ASEAN on the China versus the U.S.

Not surprisingly, given their survival is on the line, Ukraine's English language Kyiv Post has done one of the most granular dives on the elections impact that I've seen with a story that looks at, quote, "The 5 Best and Worst House Republicans for Ukraine," including their chances for re-election. And that's a pretty extraordinarily deep dive for a story in a Ukrainian paper, but really matters to them.

I've really been impressed—and you were talking about these sections that papers have—by the space and time that has been devoted to explaining the mechanics and the key issues in our elections. The Irish Times, which according to the Reuters Institute at Oxford has the highest trust level in Ireland, and 18 percent of readers report logging in at least once a week, which, it's probably four or five down in this, but it's still a pretty big site. They have a "U.S. election explained" section, which includes stories on how does the Electoral College work, how do congressional races work, and stories on the potential impact of debates over abortion, immigration, the economy. It's pretty in-depth stuff.

France's Le Monde, which is the second-highest reach online in the country, and the second-highest trust rating, also has a section on the U.S. 2024 elections including an explainer on, you got it, the Electoral College. Clearly, we're not the only ones who are confused about this. And they also have this really intriguing story on how elections work more generally, a very idiosyncratic approach to vote counting, an explanation on how states are called. Does the AP call it? What are exit polls? I think that's just really intriguing. It's incredible public service journalism. And it's the sort of things we try to explain to our readers and they are explaining it to French readers. I find that really fascinating. They even have an interactive swing state simulator in which you can put Arizona in the Harris or in the Trump column and see what happens. So you can play the game. I kept thinking, is this an American paper? That was pretty cool.

As for in-depth coverage that really drew my attention. The Singapore Straits Times, which I've already mentioned, this is the most read paper offline and the third most visited news site in Singapore, according to the Reuters Institute. Their U.S. bureau chief, Bhagyashree Garekar, and I'm dying to meet her, she also covered the U.S. during the Bush, Obama administrations, and she has done this incredibly intensive coverage of this campaign throughout this year. Recent stories include a look at this Washington Post and LA Times' non-endorsement controversies, Americans mistrust of the electoral process, a takeout on what drives America's young voters—and that story is the last one so far in what has been a ten-part series slugged "American Evolution 2024." And she's gone to Springfield, Ohio, Dearborn, Michigan, Salem, New Hampshire, Nashville, Tennessee, Stewart, Florida, Charlottesville, Virginia, lots of other places. And she's looked at issues like book banning, the culture wars, the debate over the future of democracy, white rage, immigration, celebrity culture, the role of independent voters, the role of Arab voters, the role of Latino voters.

This is incredibly ambitious and costly work for a non-U.S. paper. And her editors—now, she used to be the foreign editor, so she obviously has a lot of slack with her editors—they've obviously decided it's important and their readers either will or should care, and I'm really impressed. So can I do one more thing here?

MCMAHON:
Sure, go for it.

ROBBINS:
I have an award for the snarkiest, or at least the sniffiest coverage, which goes to Politico Europe, which has sent the editor of their London Playbook PM newsletter, Emilio Casalicchio, to cover the last gas of the election here. And among his stories, a look at the, quote, "Gun-toting British Americans in Georgia who plan to vote for Donald Trump." And I have to read the lede of this, okay? And the dateline is Dahlonega, Georgia, "Fiona Bagley was born in Epsom, a historic spa town in a leafy corner of England. She owns an English goods store, a quaint tearoom, two deadly crossbows and an AK47 assault rifle. On November 5th, she will vote for Donald Trump." I'm not sure that's really a trend, but sniffy.

MCMAHON:
Very sniffy. But also, again, the extent of the coverage that we're seeing is really astonishing. As you were talking, I was getting an idea probably too late to act on in any reasonable way, but it would be really-

ROBBINS:
What, buying a crossbow?

MCMAHON:
No, more of a informational service. It would be really neat to have some sort of aggregator site that cherry-picks the best coverage of the elections from the rest of the world. I think it would be a service to Americans as well as the rest of the world, but maybe that's a service we're providing, Carla, who knows

I would also say let's not forget podcasts. I'm still discovering podcasts outside the U.S. that I can listen to and understand. And I already mentioned I'm a fan of The Rest is Politics, where you have two former UK insiders, one former Tory MP, other who used to work for Tony Blair, riffing on the U.S. elections in a very sophisticated way. They both went to the conventions and had lots of interesting insights. And they've also had a spinoff called The Rest is Politics US, that is Katty Kay, BBC and Anthony Scaramucci, you might recall from the former Trump—brief Trump aide—

ROBBINS:
Very brief.

MCMAHON:
I believe it's the most listened to podcast in Europe, the main Rest is Politics podcast. They spend an enormous amount of time on the U.S. elections, why they matter, and they really try to relate it to British politics and other democratic politics as much as possible.

Australian Broadcasting Corporation does a nice job. They had a recent podcast where they, first of all, noted there's one hundred thousand Americans who live in Australia who are going to vote absentee. That's a lot bigger figure than I would've imagined. And they went out of the way to find two representatives of voters, one who's going to vote for Harris or already has, and one who has voted for Trump, and why that is. And it was a very interesting discussion they had with both who are sitting as far away as you can from the United States while voting and having really clear passions about how the election is going to turn out and what they think about the candidates and so forth.

And then, I'm sure there are many other podcasts that are doing some of the same, but it is an indication, again, of just the intensity of interest and how that's driving places to really invest in and show the level of interest in the United States still to this day at a time when people think that kind of interest is waning.

I'd also like to just call out for listeners interested in foreign policy that CFR itself has a web hub, CFR.org's special Election 2024 hub, where we track both major candidates positions on ten crucial foreign policy issues from Ukraine, Middle East policy, trade, climate change and so forth. Please go to CFR.org for that.

ROBBINS:
Finally, I think this also raised quite an interesting phenomenon, which is how many people who are expats who are living in the United States and that these news sites are also writing for and providing public service journalism. La Nación in Buenos Aires, which is a pretty conservative newspaper, has run—these aren't stories, they're basically just public service announcements in the paper—"Where to Vote in Miami, Florida in the 2024 Election" for Argentine Americans reading La Nación online, or "If You Made a Mistake When Voting in California, Here's What You Can Do to Rectify It"—I didn't know that you could even do that. And my particular favorite, "U.S. Elections 2024: Can You Vote With a Gun License in Texas?"

MCMAHON:
Very interesting.

ROBBINS:
Can you bet the answer to that?

MCMAHON:
I would bet, yes.

ROBBINS:
You've clearly been reading La Nación. Bob, God, it sounds like the last election seems so long ago, but maybe it's the PTSD from this election. Can you compare this year's foreign coverage to previous years' anxiety levels, quality? Certainly, this isn't the first U.S. election to hold global attention.

MCMAHON:
Yeah. And it's worth saying first, there is some phrase that comes up a lot, which is "this is the most consequential election in our lifetime", and young people tend to say it. Many times, young people who are voting for the first time, and it does feel that way for them, and that's understandable, but I have certainly seen other elections like that.

This one, given the length and the intensity, and—let's not forget—it's the divisiveness that's been stirred up. You've had two clear-cut attempts at assassinating candidate Trump among other things, and some really nasty language that's been appearing in ways that just feel very different. And we've had our share of political campaigns that have been nasty certainly, but this one's just different.

And I would say that, overall, this one, it's partly a feel thing. Having covered and viewed election cycles, it just feels like this is a bigger amount of attention. It has to do with the way the media covers things, the ability of international media to do this kind of coverage that you mentioned, I think, Carla, some of it can be done from the home countries using digital media, while, certainly, some are investing in people coming into the United States and going to swing states and interviewing people in cafés and so forth.

I do think there feels like there's a greater deal of interest, partly because of something you mentioned at the outset, which is the sense of democracy in decline, or at least on the run in some places where democracy really matters and people might've taken it for granted. And so, media—tend to be free media where there is democracy—these media will step up and they will play a role. And it's self-interest, it's broader interest, it's public interest. And I think they're really seizing on something that they feel is under threat this year.

The Council's been doing a lot of more writing recently, and our colleague, Jim Lindsay, has been doing a lot on what's so-called "axis of autocracies," Russia, China, North Korea and Iran becoming more of, potentially, a threat and more of an in sync threat. That has aroused concern. These countries, many of them are also involved in misinformation campaigns, Russia in particular, really extensive campaign to try to drum up divisiveness in the United States and seeming to succeed in some respects.

And there's just a great deal of unknowns about what a second Trump administration will mean for the world. He is a wild card. It's not showing favoritism one way or another, it's just he is a different animal as it pertains to foreign policy. Some of his backers certainly like that, others dismiss that and try to normalize some of what he's saying. And it clearly arouses interest. And you mentioned Elon Musk, that's a new variable that has never been the case before. And this is Elon Musk who owns still one of the largest social media platforms, at least one of the more intense places for exchanging views and information, which is X or formerly Twitter. So I think that adds to this being a different type of campaign than previous ones.

And again, my first foray of living abroad happened in the year that George H. W. Bush ran against Bill Clinton and I was starting freshly for Radio Free Europe at the time in Munich. And at the time, it was seen as an upset. Everybody thought George H. W. Bush, he's an incumbent, he's powerful, he's from this generation that won the Cold War, and Bill Clinton comes in and defeats him. And the people at the radios were astounded, people from the other countries in the Eastern Bloc, but they were also full of admiration that the U.S. was peacefully handing over power in this fashion, and it was something that they wished for their own countries to emulate. And some of the countries that these people, my colleagues in those days, represented, have emulated that, others have not.

I recall a conversation I had with a fellow broadcaster who's from the Russian service, very proud of his Russian culture and his background, but also, a huge admirer of the United States. And I remember saying to him, "It's sometimes an intense thing to be in the United States because it just feels like it's the center of the world and there's no regard for the rest of the world." And he said, "Well, Bob, it is the center of the world. I certainly consider it that. And I think a lot of people are envious of the United States." And so, there's a little of that.

I don't want to take it too far Carla, but I do think that U.S. presidential elections have been increasingly followed, they've been followed with the globalization of media, with the digitization of media. And then, you have this hugely unusual and extremely long campaign this year. Not only that, you had his sitting president bow out the summer before the elections, let's not forget that. And his vice president, who would become the first woman, first South Asian, African-American woman becoming president. All of that adds to a huge fascination. And I think it just makes this much different.

The only other thing I would compare it to from my own time and sort of traveling around and covering elections was a little bit of the 2008 campaign where you had Barack Obama emerging who ended up becoming the first Black American president and his very competitive primary against Hillary Clinton, who was a globally known candidate as well. And not to mention John McCain, the military hero running, that had a lot of elements that fascinated the world and got a huge amount of attention, but this one just feels even more different.

ROBBINS:
So we've basically been looking at uncensored news. When we've been looking at it, I thought it might be good for us to take a look at what's going on in RT and Sputnik and the Global Times, the Chinese sites. And these, of course, change every day, but I think it's sort of useful to see what they're putting out. They're keeping in mind that they're pushing this globally, not so much domestically, but it is interesting to see the narrative.

A lot, predictably, about Ukraine at the top of the site right now on RT, but look for what they're talking about. "Russian Disinformation Fighters to Sue FBI," sort of turning things upside down there. "Harris Campaign Manipulating Social Media Researcher Says," "Trump Rides in Garbage Truck," so they're not above tweaking both sides there. That seems to sort of have seized RT.

Sputnik, here's my particular favorite here, which is on the off-lede right now. I suppose the left is the off-lede, isn't it, on websites? I always get confused about websites.

MCMAHON:
You know, yeah-

ROBBINS:
Maybe that's the lede.

MCMAHON:
Yes and no.

ROBBINS:
Maybe that's the lede.

MCMAHON:
It depends on the design, frankly, these days.

ROBBINS:
I'm so old-fashioned, but it looks like a newspaper..."What U.S. Celebrities Are Endorsing Harris and What Are Endorsing Trump," part two and part one. That seems to be particularly fun. We could spend some time on that one here. "Trump Versus Harris: Who Are the Big Money Players Supporting the Candidates?" Is that really a public service? That wouldn't be a bad thing for us to be covering.

And finally, the Global Times. On the top of the site, Letters from Xi, always favorite feature there. "Europe Should Not Continue Down the Misguided Path of Protectionism," which is quite interesting. This goes to the question of who would they prefer there?

MCMAHON:
Mm-hmm.

ROBBINS:
And that's a big part of the coverage more generally, this sort of ambivalence. Do we like Trump as the strongman versus are we going to get into a tariff war there? But not a lot of coverage right now in the Global Times about the election, you have to really sort of scroll down on it. So lots there.

And we really hardly suggest that people dig into these sites because I think you can learn a lot to see is it predictable what is really going on inside the Chinese Communist Party about what shows up there? Because this is the face that they're pushing out to the world, not so much domestically, but I think you can begin to get a sense of where their anxieties as well as their enthusiasms are.

MCMAHON:
And Carla, I would just add to the state-controlled media, somewhat slightly different, a little bit more nuanced, shall we say, coverage from the Middle East. So you have Al-Arabiya, the Saudi state-owned website for this paper has, actually, a big countdown banner-

ROBBINS:
Oh, yeah?

MCMAHON:
...To U.S. election on its homepage. As one would expect, a great deal of coverage on pieces related to Palestine. They cover U.S.-based pro-Palestine groups. They have some coverage on Iranian interference in the U.S. election, which has come out of some of the U.S. authorities reporting about Iranian hacking of various campaign sites. The Al-Arabiya, interestingly, was at the Democratic National Convention and interviewed Iranian American actress, Nazanin Nour, talking about the interests of Iranian Americans for a Saudi audience. I think that's interesting.

ROBBINS:
It seems sort of remarkably right now, and granted, this is a snapshot just right this moment: four days, seven hours, twenty-eight minutes, and fifty-eight seconds, fifty-six seconds, fifty-five—that countdown clock is pretty extraordinary.

What's the top of the site if you go to the U.S. election page? "U.S. Elections: Trump Pulls Election Stunt as Democrats Fend Off Biden's 'Garbage' Fallout," there's a picture of him in the garbage truck that seems to have really seized the imagination and not in an attractive way for Trump. We've got, "U.S. Elections: 'I'm not a Nazi,' Trump Insists as Harris Blasts Ugly Rhetoric". We've got a lot of sort of negative on Trump: "Trump Accused of Groping Model He Met Through Jeffrey Epstein," "Trump Campaign Accuses UK's Labor Party of Election Interference," "Donald Trump Calls Himself Father of IVF at All-Women Town Hall," "Harris Mocks Trump After Rally Turns into Dance-A-Thon." There's a lot of Trump, not all that much about Harris and not particularly positive toward Trump. I don't know. What do we learn about that from—maybe it's just today, and if we were to go look at it tomorrow, it would look differently—but "Trump Says He Thinks Israel Should Hit Iran Nuclear Facilities." It's right there. All-

MCMAHON:
So make of it what you will, but that's a snapshot from a-

ROBBINS:
Snapshot-

MCMAHON:
...A country that had close, shall we say, alignment with the Trump administration first time around. So very interesting.

ROBBINS:
The tea leaves of the website.

MCMAHON:
Al-Jazeera, Qatar-owned, has always had a very big, robust presence in the United States, and has tried to actually mirror some of the bigger U.S. media in some regards and some of the ways they cover things. They portray the Middle East view in the U.S. They're not seeing a great deal of difference between the two candidates at this point according to some of their coverage.

They got into covering the brouhaha over the Madison Square Garden rally and have a piece titled, "Could Puerto Rican Voters Hurt Trump in U.S. Election After Jibe at Rally." One of the speakers at that rally, called it an island of garbage. And that's become a big issue in the U.S., a lot of Rican voters in the swing state of Pennsylvania. And on and on.

There's other Middle East papers we'll cover, as you would expect as well, with a real interest in who's going to potentially steer things in a different direction in the Middle East given the real gloom over what's played out since the October 7th events of a year ago. And we've talked about that quite a bit. So again, there's a different prism from the state-owned, but it's still quite a bit of resources have been applied towards trying to understand what the American voter is thinking and how that translates into the government changing anything.

And one other thing I would just note in that we kicked off our affiliate podcast, Why It Matters. They kicked off their season looking at why the world is obsessed with this election, especially through a German lens. And they had very interesting interviews, including with Stefan Kornelius.

ROBBINS:
A great guy, wonderful journalist.

MCMAHON:
Great editor of Süddeutsche Zeitung. And I thought he had a really important sort of summing up of how Europe is looking at this, why it's intense, and why the world may be at a change moment given what's at stake. I'll just quote him, he said, "We live through an American century. We live through a century where all institutions after World War II were set up on the American idea of sharing power, of global governance, the UN system, the World Bank system, all of this. We all agree that this all needs renovation, this all needs kind of remodeling because the world has changed." And I think it's an interesting way to think about it, again, from a country deeply invested in what's going on in the United States and how to think about what's at stake in the election. And next time we sit down here, Carla, we'll know a little bit more perhaps.

ROBBINS:
Perhaps. Thursday after Tuesday? Who knows if-

MCMAHON:
Who knows?

ROBBINS:
We'll have a new countdown clock, the countdown clock until we know.

MCMAHON:
And that's our look at the world next week or at the U.S. elections through the world next week. For our American listeners, be sure to cast your ballot this November 5th.

ROBBINS:
Have you voted?

MCMAHON:
I'm voting on election day.

ROBBINS:
Ah, I voted.
Please subscribe to The World Next Week on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcast platform. And leave us a review while you're at it. We appreciate the feedback. If you'd like to reach out, please email us at [email protected]. The publications mentioned in this episode, and there's certainly going to be a lot of them, as well as the transcript of our conversation are listed on the podcast page for The World Next Week on CFR.org. Please note that opinions expressed on The World Next Week are solely those of the host, not of CFR, which takes no institutional positions on matters of policy.

Today's program was produced by Ester Fang with Director of Podcasting, Gabrielle Sierra, and special, special thanks to Helena Kopans-Johnson and Colette Yamashita Holcomb for their incredible research assistance this week. Our theme music is provided by–he's everywhere–Markus Zakaria. And this is Carla Robbins saying so long. And as Bob says, make sure you vote.

MCMAHON:
And this is Bob McMahon saying goodbye and be careful out there as you vote.