How does the Fort Worth Star-Telegram recommend candidates in elections? Let me explain
Plenty of you roll your eyes when our Editorial Board recommends a candidate, I know.
But with our recommendations for the March 3 Democratic and Republican primaries complete, I want to share some of what we learned, how we approach the process and what we hope you’ll get out of it.
Our goals are simply to contribute to a better-informed electorate and help voters navigate through a blizzard of choices. We spend a considerable amount of time researching candidates’ backgrounds and their stances on issues, and before we make an endorsement, we meet with candidates to get a feel for how they think, what their priorities are and how they interact with others.
We met with dozens of candidates this year, and as always, the vast majority were friendly, thoughtful and impressive. Running for office isn’t easy. It’s admirable when anyone extends himself or herself for judgment by fellow citizens, even if they have kooky ideas or questionable motivations (which, thankfully, few do).
Among the criteria we value most in deciding who to recommend are leadership and governing experience, understanding of the issues, a demonstrated sense of how to be effective in office and a clear understanding of what voters want and need. In primaries, we factor in a candidate’s ability to run a strong general-election campaign.
Our resources are limited, so we focus on competitive races, specifically those in Tarrant County and, as much as possible, statewide offices. To be able to zero in on local contests, one of the races we won’t make a recommendation for is the presidency, either in the primaries or the general.
You’re already awash in information about the presidential candidates and the issues at stake. Given the polarized nature of our national electorate, odds are, you already know you’ll vote either for President Donald Trump or his Democratic opponent, whomever that is. And given the incredible demands on a presidential candidate’s time, it’s difficult for us to get meaningful access to them and do in-depth reporting that would inform a recommendation.
On local and state races, it’s a much different story. There’s less information available the further you go down the ballot. Candidates for Congress, state representative or city council haven’t been omnipresent in the news and the culture the way presidential candidates have. It’s there, we believe, that our journalistic experience can best serve you, by illuminating people and issues you may not be familiar with.
And ultimately, that’s what we’re trying to do. To us, it’s not about whether the candidates we recommend win. It’s more important that we lay out what we learn and give you the most-informed vote possible. If you agree with the conclusion we reach, great. If you use the information we provide to make a different choice, that’s good, too.
Texas voters have a lot of democracy to wade through, a yearlong procession of candidates, messages and issues. Our goal is to clarify the choices as much as possible. And we’ll do it several times this year, with local elections and primary runoffs in May and the general election in November.
And if you still roll your eyes, we hope it’s not because you think we’re presumptuous to make a recommendation but because we made you think.
