• by Ray Schultz , November 16, 2023

The Associated Press plays a critical role in U.S. elections, counting the vote, declaring winners and reporting the results quickly, executive editor Julie Pace said during the Web Summit conference in Lisbon this week. 

“There is no central election authority, so the AP has stepped in to play that role,” Pace said, according to an AP report on her talk.   

“There has been a shift toward more media organizations taking partisan positions, or at least reflecting different partisan views,” Pace continued. “That is not something at the AP that we do, it is not something that we have done within our 177-year history, and that is not something that is going to change. It is actually essential for us to be a fair, fact-based, nonpartisan news organization.”

In races that take more than one day to call, “it is important for AP to fill that space with explanatory information,” Pace adds. We can’t let misinformation fill that void.”

Pace encouraged newsrooms to build processes around verifying generative AI content. “Any of us in the media who ignore it at this point are doing so at their own peril,” Pace said.