API's summit on Elections, Trust and Democracy led to a 5-step process for how news organizations can do this work now — and year-round.
When we looked at the latest research on how Americans view news about elections, we noted several findings local media especially may want to use to start conversations about how they gain trust this year with their community.
We challenge local news organizations to smartly deploy their resources around the elections that most matter to their communities in 2024 — and also to think about how that energy builds to something more robust and sustained.
Last year, API distributed small grants before the midterm elections to help fuel listening experiments led by 31 news organizations across the country, legacy and startup newsrooms across digital, print and broadcast platforms. What did they learn from these sessions, and how might those lessons be integrated into their elections coverage in the future?
If you want a truly accurate and helpful public square, one capable of helping a pluralistic democratic republic survive, you have to think about the well-being of the people who make up the press.