The battle for the US presidential election really starts on the night between Thursday and Friday, when the Democrats Joe Biden81, and the Republicans Donald Trump78, take on each other for the first time in a live televised debate.
strengthens US monitoring during important elections. Awarded for his US reporting Laura Saarikoski joins the team as an assistant. Saarikoski has worked for Helsingin Sanomat in the USA twice, first as an assistant and then as a correspondent in 1997–2001 and 2014–2018.
Saarikoski advises what you should pay attention to in the first debate: how well President Joe Biden is doing. The age of the candidates has spoken a lot during the election, and especially Biden’s ability to carry out the duties of the president for four more years has been discussed.
– Is Biden strong enough to continue? Is he against Trump? And vice versa: How persuasive is Trump in offering an alternative? Is he aggressive enough for his supporters, but not too crazy?
Saarikoski points out that for many Americans, the presidential election is not about substantive issues. They know what Trump and Biden stand for.
– Here the question is more about how much they trust and how much they intuitively feel that the candidates represent themselves and their own world view.
Biden and Trump will meet in a debate on the news channel CNN on Friday morning at four o’clock Finnish time. ‘s foreign supplier familiar with the United States Ilmari Reunamäki follow the debate on ‘s website.
Pod series from Tika
At the core of ‘s election team is the US correspondent Iida Tikka. Tikka has spent the last few months traveling around the United States looking for an answer to the question why the presidential candidates are once again Joe Biden and Donald Trump.
– I have specifically found out what are the big development costs that have led to the election situation, and what is happening to the entire American democracy, Tikka says.
From Tika’s reports, the Mureneva maa podcast series is born, the episodes of which will start publishing at the end of September.
Foreign reporter Jenny Matikainen on the other hand, has been to Eagle Pass to the border between Mexico and the United States to investigate one of the hottest election issues: immigration. At the turn of the year, up to a thousand people a day came across the border to the small town.
– We have met a lot of people and asked them what they think about this matter and whether the presidential candidates can solve what many call a crisis, says Matikainen.
Matikainen’s reports are published on ‘s website under elections.
Matikainen and Tikka talk about their plans in the video below:
In addition, the US elections will follow during the fall, summarized by Ilmari Reunamäki and a reporter in Washington Yuri von Bonsdorff. Bonsdorff is heavily involved in the coverage of Biden and Trump’s first televised debate and Trump’s trials. In addition, Bonsdorff has a series of stories about young voters coming out.
Saarikoski goes to the angelic states
During the summer, Laura Saarikoski will go on site to the United States and do election reports for ‘s website and television. He says he wants to find out what Americans really think.
– I am very eager to go to the polls to see what has happened in the United States. It’s hard to find out what’s going on there by following the American media. The media is so divided. That is why it is essential to go to the place yourself and outside the big cities.
Saarikoski plans to go to the states of Libra, where the presidential elections will be decided. The US presidential election is an electoral college, and the candidate with the most votes in each state receives all of the electors in that state. In the last elections, Nevada, Arizona, Michigan and Pennsylvania have been in the balance.
Saarikoski raises three big questions that are of particular interest to him in the election fields.
– One is whether Trump’s shock effect has subsided. I feel like people have gotten used to his rhetoric in eight years. Many of his opinions have become more mainstream, which is also reflected in the support figures, Saarikoski estimates.
– The second is what troubles the Democrats. The US economy is doing really well, and it should rain down on the sitting president. How is it possible that a president who has done so well in the economy is in so much trouble against Trump?
He suspects that Democrats may repeat the same mistake they made in the 2016 presidential election, when Hillary Clinton was the Democratic presidential candidate.
– Young voters in particular are critical of Biden because they would like a more progressive or leftist candidate. Therefore, young people may stay home or vote for a third-party candidate, which benefits Trump.
In the 2016 elections, the favorite of young Democrats was the senator from Vermont, who idealizes a Nordic welfare state Bernie Sanderswho spoke for free education and comprehensive healthcare.
– The third is, is the United States no longer interested in maintaining its international superpower status, or is it cowering inward in its foreign and economic policy?
– It will have significant effects on Finland’s security if the United States is less interested in NATO and the defense of European countries, says Saarikoski.
Laura Saarikoski, awarded for her US reporting, is the former editor-in-chief of Helsingin Sanomat. He also wrote during his years in the United States together with his spouse Saska Saarikoski with the book Trump – A Man Like America.
The graphic below shows what will happen in the US presidential elections in the coming months.