The UK broadcast media has a habit of playing up US presidential elections as the event of the year, and to be fair, they occasionally are. But who won the broadcast fight for viewers – not in ratings, where the BBC always wins – but in quality for the viewing hundreds who stayed up?
Like the general election on this side of the pond, the broadcast media waged war to get the best bookings, experience, and (sometimes) the quickest results. Each broadcaster sends a team to Washington, which links up with teams across America and often back home, and some of the rest of us stay up to watch. Funny that we do, because nothing really happens until about 2:30 AM.
BBC: US Election 2024
The BBC’s coverage. Always slick, always authoritative. Yet this year, they missed the mark in some way. It started at 10:50pm, with this year’s slightly less memorable remix of their “Arthur” theme tune. Using graphics slightly rehashed from July’s election is passable, their presenters certainly knew what they were covering but were slightly let down by the fact that Brits might not know who Caitríona Perry and Sumi Somaskanda are.
The BBC flew their recent, accidental news icon, Clive Myrie, out to Washington, before keeping him on the side of a building, which seemed a waste. And I can’t help but wonder if their editors liked the colour purple or not.
For the network which pledged to: “cut through the noise, so you can see things clearly”, the graphics, which barely disappeared the whole night, certainly had a lot going on at once. We did, apparently, need three cameras at once on an empty stage.
ITV: Harris vs Trump – The Results
Does poor Tom Bradby ever get a break? From anchoring the Budget last week, he pops straight on the plane to Washington to do this eight-hour extravaganza. Slick, stylish, very ITV. Bonus points for the informed panel. It was a simple affair too, not many cameras, graphics barely taking up any of the screen (looking at you, BBC) and overall an evening which may have been boring, but at least you could tell ITV wanted to make the night a priority, something that we never got from the Beeb.
It was election night painted by numbers – vox pops from both Democrats and Republicans (and credit to ITV for finding the occasional third-party voter); discussion about different voting models, and the result that each network was forecasting. Talking of which – ITV was very cautious about declaring states until CNN called them at the top of the hour. I had ITV and the Spanish network Telecinco on at the same time, and both gave wildly different results (they handed Harris 70 more electoral votes than Tom had authorised at around 3 AM).
Channel 4: America Decides
But what if you didn’t quite feel like hours of debate? Fresh from July’s acclaimed election coverage with Emily Maitlis and Krishnan Guru-Murphy, Channel 4 flew the duo out to Washington to serve up the channel’s first US election coverage since 1992. The coverage started early at 10pm, even.
July’s election was pretty much a done deal that Labour would get a majority so massive Starmer would barely know what to do with it, so Channel 4 decided to just focus on more chat, entertainment and having a laugh with the audience, with a provocative guest list that gave us the spectacle of Nadine Dorries’ argument with Alastair Campbell.
This time, the network which handed us Big Brother brought out all the tropes to ‘provoke a reaction’ (strokes beard). This included an even more provocative guest list, with Boris Johnson fired halfway through the broadcast for relentlessly plugging his new book, Unleashed. Stormy Daniels turned up halfway through, but the atmosphere was already her namesake.
Emily Maitlis was admonished by Krishnan later for letting a curse slip when a Trump victory was inevitable. But so heated was Channel 4’s coverage that one can forgive the hosts for immersing themselves in the action. Talk about a sour taste in the mouth – you wouldn’t have watched it for fast results (often I changed the channel to find Krishnan declaring a result that even ITV had called five minutes before), but for a bit of early-morning delirium, one had the perfect place.
Oh – and did I mention Boris Johnson has a new book? It’s called Unleashed. Apparently, you can find any answer to any question Krishnan wanted to ask him in the book… let me know if you actually do.
Sky News: America Votes
Did you really think Channel 4 starting at 10pm was early? I give you Sky, who started three hours before and didn’t stop until the morning. They must pay Mark Austin a shedload.
Credit for co-host Yalda Hakim, meanwhile, with the opening: “Harris, the first black woman to run. Trump, the first convicted felon.”
Ex-BBC man Lewis Goodall was on the fancy graphics, and it all made for a sleek production, complete with a dramatic music score by Neil Myers. But, with starting so early, you need filler, so if you too want to watch empty polling booths for an hour or so, Bob’s your uncle.
Overall, it’s a win for those of you who went to bed, woke up, checked and saw Harris had truly been Trumped in a landslide. And if you want any juicy gossip to read about the inner workings of Parliament, you can find it all in Boris Johnson’s new book, Unleashed. I might have forgotten to mention it.