This story was written by Teen Vogue's 2024 Student Correspondents, a team of college students and recent graduates covering the election cycle from key battleground states.
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With a summer that saw President Joe Biden dropping out of the presidential race and two assassination attempts on former president Donald Trump, the 2024 presidential election has brought multiple shocking, historic moments in the run-up to November. The press has been there every minute, chasing developments in the campaigns of the Democratic and Republican tickets.
Two of those journalists are NBC News Washington correspondent Yamiche Alcindor and correspondent Dasha Burns. Alcindor pivoted from covering Biden’s campaign to focusing on Vice President Kamala Harris after she became the nominee this summer. (She's covered Harris for much of her career). Burns has focused on the Trump campaign, primarily reporting from the Rust Belt. In a pair of phone interviews, Teen Vogue spoke to the two young journalists about how to cover an ever-changing election and what it means to be a reporter.
This conversation has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity.
Teen Vogue: How did the presidential debate between Trump and Harris change the race and how you’ll be reporting on it?
Dasha Burns: This was the first time that we got to see the contrast of these two candidates, not just in the substance of what they said on policy, on the issues, but the contrast in tone, the contrast to approach, the age and gender and race. You could not get two more polar opposite people running against each other in this race.
Yamiche Alcindor: I've talked to some voters who say that after the debate, they saw Vice President Harris as coming out on top, that she was really having a better performance and coming out stronger, and that they want to support her… [But] there are some people who are still undecided, and as we can see in the polls this is still very much a tight race.
TV: What have you been hearing from voters more broadly?
YA: So, for the Trump supporters that I've talked to, they really feel like the country's going in the wrong direction… They feel like gas is too high, groceries are too expensive, and that Donald Trump, during his presidency, really had the answer for those problems. For people who are now supporting Vice President Harris, they say that they have some of the same concerns, which are that they, too, are concerned about the costs of living. They, too, are concerned about how to survive and thrive. They, too, are concerned about the border and immigration and how all that is playing out. But, their view is that Vice President Harris and the Democrats have the solution and that solution is to continue with a lot of the policies of President Biden.
DB: The overall sentiment is just a lot of frustration and looking for somebody that speaks to the issues. And it's why you hear whether they're on the left or on the right, people getting a little exasperated with the personal attacks and with politicians who make things about themselves rather than about the people, and really seeking out some authenticity in the people that are representing them.
TV: How do you go about getting voters to speak with you, especially those who are hesitant to speak with the media?
YA: So, I approach this the way I approached it when I was starting out as a reporter. My first job was at a local weekly African American newspaper. And I was taught back then to just be genuinely interested in people, be really interested in listening to people, and make sure that you're not coming with a sort of preconceived notion. And, as a result, you get people to open up by just being genuinely interested in their lives.
TV: Is there something that the press needs to do more reporting on? Are you reflecting that in your coverage?
DB: We tend to get distracted by the latest shiny thing. I think that's something that's a danger for our industry. Whatever the catchy headline is, there's an instinct right now to just run in that direction. One thing that our political team has been prioritizing is, let's think before we sprint. If we want to get there, we want to be fast, but we want to be accurate.
TV: What has been the most challenging aspect of covering this election?
YA: It's a challenge at times to get people to tell you what they really think about things. But I also think that that's the beauty of being a reporter who's genuinely interested in why people see the world as they do… I also think it's challenging sometimes because you have to talk to people for 30 minutes before someone tells you what they really think about this election.… I appreciate the fact that even in a television report, where sometimes our stories can be three minutes or four minutes or two minutes, I work at a place where we have so many different platforms that we can tell the stories in so many different ways.
TV: What’s your journalistic philosophy?
DB: I was in Butler, Pennsylvania, during the assassination attempt on the former president and it was something that shook me. You know, it wasn't easy to get through that, but it really crystallized why we do what we do. How important the public service is of informing voters in moments of chaos and confusion, of getting viewers accurate, clear information as these situations are developing. And it's when your sort of mental fortitude is tested. You just kind of remember the fundamental reason you're doing this, the thing that drives you to push through exhaustion, anxiety, and situations of crisis because it matters. The fourth estate matters.
YA: What informs my journalistic philosophy is the Constitution. I love the fact that our profession is written into the founding documents of our country, that freedom of the press was something so important that the people who were founding America decided they needed to make sure [journalists] were part of that. So, to me, it's about ensuring that we have a free press and that I'm using the responsibilities of being part of that free press in the best way possible.
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