BBG Watch Commentary
As of 3:20 AM ET, Wednesday morning, November 5, 2014, VOA’s online “NOW PLAYING: Live audio” of VOA radio was playing non-stop music instead of providing news reports or analysis of U.S. elections results. The same was true during Tuesday evening. VOA radio newscasts available online Tuesday evening did not even mention U.S. elections and did not have any U.S. domestic news.
Continuous music on the main VOA English online radio channel on the morning after the U.S. elections.
Voice of America midnight (12:00AM ET 11-5-2014) radio newscast – not a word about U.S. elections
Voice of America Radio On Demand-Online World News 12 Midnight 11-5-14 Downloaded 12:40 AM
This Voice of America (VOA) radio “Latest Newscast” available online from the VOA website after 12 Midnight, November 5, 2014, not only does not have any U.S. elections news, it has no U.S. news other than a White House reaction to a military crisis in an African country. The VOA 12:00 AM ET newscast is almost entirely focused on African news. There is no U.S. or Asian news in this VOA newscast. No mention of key U.S. elections.
11:45 PM – BBC, CNN, FOX, CNBC and RT reported Republican Senate Majority – Voice of America has not
Update: Far behind other major U.S. and international media, VOA English News finally updated its headline around 12:00 AM ET to show that Republicans won control of the Senate.
The following comment was posted on the Voice of America website:
Ed from: Virginia
November 04, 2014 11:03 PM“Sorry VOA — but I and others are watching TV, and the BBC. Where is your live coverage? What a shame that this country can’t get more than a few stories on the Voice of America’s front page.”
BBG Watch received these comments from former Voice of America correspondents:
“This is truly embarrassing — clearly a decision was made to simply
write the election story and carry desk stories through the evening.
No live programming, unless they come up with something in the next
two hours, which I doubt. What can one say? BBC had correspondents
in various locations (Iowa, etc) — VOA had desk write-thrus, and one piece
I saw from Jim Malone, which was obviously canned long in advance.What a dark mark on VOA. Makes me glad I am no longer there.”
“I am simply floored. It’s like Ensor and Redisch
said ‘let’s just cover this one from the desk.’How utterly depressing and embarrassing for VOA,
and for this country.”
“I think it would be quite instructive
for Mr. Lack and others to contrast
the live BBC show with the performance of the VOA site, and VOA in
general.”
“BBC just wiping the plate clean — look at all the talent/analysts they had.”
“Needless to observe, but BBC is wiping VOA in the dirt with wall to wall digital/web and live TV coverage.”
11:00PM ET – U.S. election night – hardly any Tweets from Voice of America English News
The last three VOA English News Tweets at 11:07 PM ET are four hours, two hours, and 40 minutes old.
In addition to slow updating of Voice of America (VOA) English news website, VOA English news Twitter, and absolutely no U.S. election coverage on VOA radio in the last few hours, VOA English Facebook page is also not being updated with U.S. election results.
VOA has just posted some U.S. election photos on VOA English Facebook page, but the last substantive VOA English Facebook U.S. election related posts are now six and ten hours old.
10:00PM ET 11-4-14 VOA LATEST, ON-DEMAND, ONLINE RADIO NEWSCAST. This Voice of America English newscast downloaded shortly after 10PM ET on U.S. election night, November 4, 2014, did not have a single U.S. news item and no U.S. election coverage whatsoever.