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 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, while 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.
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