Your News Channel’s editorial approach to covering the 2024 General Election

Our goal is to produce accurate, transparent, and trustworthy coverage for members of an engaged and informed local electorate.

As we approach the 2024 general election, concerns about misinformation, AI-driven deepfakes and election security each have the potential to cloud editorial coverage.

Your News Channel is committed to producing accurate, transparent and unbiased election coverage. The presidential race is the biggest on the ballot, but we will also be focused on covering the California State Assembly and Senate races, local mayoral races like in Santa Maria, and following key local propositions that will impact voter’s pockets.

Earning Trust Through Transparency

While it is impossible to plan for every potential coverage scenario, it is our intention to explain our overall editorial approach and priorities

• To maintain continuity in our coverage, we will take a “beat” approach by assigning specific reporters to cover individual candidates and issues; this will allow our team of journalists to immerse themselves in the subject matter leading up to election day. While it may not always be possible to schedule with 100% consistency, we will do our best.
• In our TV and digital stories, we will clearly attribute sources of all data and documentation included in the report (and include hyperlinks when available).
• When we interview a candidate, we will post the full, unedited video version of the interview and a written transcription on our website and news app.
• When covering multiple candidates running for the same race, we will attempt to fairly compare each by asking the same (or similar) questions and by allowing equal time for each response.
• If a candidate chooses not to answer a direct question from one of our reporters, we will make a respectful second attempt to ask the question again. If the candidate selects to not answer a second time, we may choose to not include his/her response in our edited story (the full interview will remain available online, however).
• If we choose to interview a political expert, it will be so the individual can help explain a complex issue without taking a political position. We will thoroughly vet the individual’s background and explain why the interview is important/relevant.
• When we stream or air a scheduled candidate speech, we will request a hard copy in advance and, when provided, post it with the archived video of the speech.

We will also publish an online Voter Guide to help you do your own research on the candidates and issues that will be on November’s ballot. The Voter Guide will include links to an online “Civic Center” powered by BallotReady.com; the resource provides information on voter registration, candidate/issue research and sample ballots.

Our Coverage Priorities

As an independent newsgathering organization, we have developed the following coverage priorities to guide our political reporting. The list was derived from feedback and internal newsroom discussions.

• Economy: Those on the central coast and across the nation are feeling the pinch of inflation. In many cases, raises don’t equal cost of living increases and many need two jobs to afford to live on the central coast. We will ask about spending priorities and strategies to keep budgets balanced.
• Crime: As part of our commitment to covering public safety, we will track major crime issues on the central coast and ask candidates how they plan to address those issues.
• Housing: Like the rest of the country, affordable housing is an issue facing many central coast residents. At the same time, the number of people experiencing homelessness is also increasing. We will ask candidates how they plan to address housing issues on the central coast.

Tracking polls (aka “horse race” polls) may be included as a springboard into an in-depth report or to add context within a story. Here are links to the polls we will be monitoring, including those used by the broadcast networks.

• Emerson College
• Fox News Polls (Beacon Research (D) and Shaw & Company Research (R))
• Kaiser Family Foundation
• Harvard Harris Poll
• Langer Research Associates (ABC News)
• Monmouth University
• Pew Research Center
• Project FiveThirtyEight (ABC News)
• Public Opinion Strategies (NBC News)
• Quinnipiac University
• Rasmussen Reports
• Real Clear Politics
• YouGov (CBS News)

Producing Accurate & Unbiased Coverage

According to the American Psychological Association, implicit bias “is a negative attitude, of which one is not consciously aware, against a specific social group. Implicit bias is thought to be shaped by experience and based on learned associations between particular qualities and social categories, including race and/or gender. Individuals’ perceptions and behaviors can be influenced by the implicit biases they hold, even if they are unaware, they hold such biases.”

Awareness and knowledge of the potential for implicit bias are our best defenses against it influencing our reporting. We have already adopted the following best practices from the Center for Racial Justice Innovation into our companywide editorial guidelines, and will apply them to our political coverage:

• Avoid stereotypes
• Use a multiracial lens, and consider all communities of color.
• Focus on actions and impacts, rather than attitudes and intentions.
• Ensure headlines, images, captions and graphics are fair and responsible in their depiction of people (of color), and coverage of the issues.

We will also assign reporters to fact-check statements made by candidates during campaign appearances and in advertising messages paid for by individual campaigns and/or political action committees. Fact-check reporting will include attribution to the sources used to confirm or contradict candidate statements, and we will also include information about who is paying for advertising messages.

Get Engaged and Informed by Checking Our Online Voter’s Guide

To track the stories that are most important to you, we invite you to create a user profile on our website by clicking the bell icon at the bottom right of your screen.  Here are the benefits of creating an account:

• Personalized profile allows you to create a site avatar and keep track of your personal engagement history.
• Personalized news feed allows you to follow your favorite authors and/or topics.
• Allows you to comment on articles and use the notification tray to let you know when another commenter has responded to a thread you’re following.
• Receive notifications when there is breaking news, severe weather or a local event livestream.