How The Times’s Home Page Comes Together on Election Night
“It’s about being prepared, but also being able to pivot,” said Justin O’Neill, one of the editors who programs the home page at night.
Election Day is five days away. Every day of the countdown, Inside The Times will share an article about how our election coverage works. Today, learn how the home page will come together on the big night.
On election night, news comes fast and furious. House and Senate seats flip, hundreds of local and state races are called, and the nation edges closer to learning who will lead it for the next four years.
New York Times journalists around the country will cover it all, filing dispatches from battlegrounds, analyzing and reporting real-time data, and putting all the chaos into context for readers.
The top news of the night — and there’s a lot of it — is displayed on The Times’s home page and in the Times app.
Programming the home page on any given day is no easy feat. A team of journalists across four cities and time zones (New York, Los Angeles, London and Seoul) is responsible for selecting the newsiest stories to populate the home page, while also keeping the page accurate, timely and engaging, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
And on election night, things are even trickier. The home page must seamlessly bring together work from different parts of the newsroom, including articles from political reporters; live results graphics and race forecasts from The Times’s election results team; and videos with reporters who break down what’s happening across the country.
“Elections are the most exciting nights in journalism,” said Steve Kenny, a senior editor who oversees news coverage and the home page at night. “I’ve been a part of them since 1980, and they never cease to be thrilling.”