Univision is broadcasting presidential town halls with both former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, to be moderated by Enrique Acevedo. An English-language feed will be made available on YouTube, however, we believe an event of this magnitude should be made available over the air, and accessible to as many viewers as possible.
Per the TelevisaUnivision press release:
The special “Los Latinos Preguntan … Donald Trump Responde” (Latinos Ask...Donald Trump Answers) will air on Tuesday, Oct 8, at 10 p.m. ET from Miami, Fla. “Los Latinos Preguntan … Kamala Harris Responde” (Latinos Ask...Kamala Harris Answers) will air on Thursday, Oct 10, at 10 p.m. ET from Las Vegas, Nev. Both events will air coast-to-coast with Spanish-language translation on Univision and stream on ViX’s Noticias 24/7 channel and will also be available in English on Noticias Univision’s YouTube channel.
With one month to go until the U.S. presidential election, journalist Enrique Acevedo will moderate both town halls, featuring undecided Hispanic voters who will take the microphone to ask questions of each candidate. Former President Trump and Vice President Harris will address key issues that are on the top of voters’ minds, including the economy, jobs, healthcare, immigration and foreign policy. The events will put an electorate that represents close to 15% of the voting bloc front and center, creating a forum exclusively for Latinos.
The forum might be marketed by Univision as “exclusively for Latinos”, but will undoubtedly draw the eyes of the entire nation. This is especially so, given the fact that no additional presidential debates have been agreed upon.
Additionally, Vice President Kamala Harris has been largely unavailable to the press in extended unscripted forums. The town hall will place her in front of voters with direct questions, something the nation hasn’t seen since 2019.
Rather than limiting the English-language feed to Univision’s YouTube channel, the network should do what it did with the English-language versions of the respective interviews with Trump and with President Joe Biden. Each of these aired on sister network UniMás, which is widely accessible both via paid services and over the air.
The electorate at large benefitted from the ability to watch these interviews and would equally benefit from watching these candidates in the unscripted environment that a town hall represents. Univision is in a position to expose broad swaths of the voting American public to these candidates in this environment. In service of the public interest, I call upon the network to broadcast its original English-language feeds on UniMás.
