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The Documentary Podcast

US local news 2024: On the front page frontline

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.32.6K Ratings

🗓️ 7 October 2024

⏱️ 27 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Gary O'Donoghue meets local newspaper editors in America to hear about the challenge of reporting during a divisive presidential election campaign. In Kansas, Gary visits Eric Meyer, the owner and editor of the Marion County Record. In August 2023 the paper’s offices, and the home of its 90-year-old owner, Eric’s mother Joan, were raided by the town's five person police department. A "good old fashioned newspaper war" has been playing out in Westcliffe, Colorado, where Gary meets Jordan Hedberg, editor of the Wet Mountain Tribune. In the same town, the Sangre de Cristo Sentinel, promises “a different view from the same mountains”. Gary also hears about how trust in local news, which has traditionally played a big part in local politics, is being eroded.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

So this is Marion City.

0:05.0

Although city is a little bit of an exaggeration.

0:08.0

It's 1900 people.

0:10.0

And we've driven about 10 miles off the main road to get here and we've only really passed I think two other vehicles

0:16.1

so Marion is in the middle of nowhere in the heart of America but for the last year or so Marion

0:21.9

has been also at the heart of the debate over press freedom,

0:27.5

America's First Amendment and the role of local newspapers in their communities.

0:34.0

Tonight there are important questions about the First Amendment following a police

0:38.7

raid on a small town newspaper in Kansas.

0:41.4

More than 30 news organizations have condemned the raid.

0:44.5

From the BBC World Service this is the documentary with me Gary O'Donohue.

0:49.2

Welcome to US Local News 2024 on the front page frontline.

0:55.0

I'm a BBC correspondent usually based in Washington DC reporting on national stories. During this election year in America, I've

1:06.2

been present at some of the most dramatic moments of the presidential campaign.

1:11.1

I was there in Butler, Pennsylvania when I reported on the attempted assassination

1:16.2

of Donald Trump. I was in Philadelphia for the presidential debate, but today I'm over

1:21.0

1,200 miles away in a town in Kansas to visit its newspaper, the Marion County Record,

1:28.4

because I want to find out if the divisions of national politics are being manifested in small towns like this one. Hi there.

1:44.0

Hello, how are you?

1:45.0

Not too bad.

1:46.0

I've just got the water and the Marion County

1:48.0

record.

...

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