05 November 2020

Newsnight viewers praise Emily Maitlis for interview with Republican over mail-in ballot controversy

Newsnight host Emily Maitlis has made her own headlines once again after challenging a Republican politician on mail-in ballots.

As Donald Trump continues to claim large-scale fraud and the halting of vote counting, Randi Reed told the BBC host: "Well the whole mail-in voting delegitimises the entire voting process."

Maitlis then responded: “So mail-in voting during a pandemic shouldn’t be allowed?”

Reed then continued: "I didn’t say it shouldn’t have been allowed, it shouldn’t have been encouraged to the extent that it was. You have protests out there, you have these extreme riots, to think you can’t go into a voting booth, six feet apart and do it safely that we all have to emergency do mail-in voting.

“It’s been the Democrats plan the entire time, again they laid it out for us.”

Maitlis challenged again: “What, it’s been the Democrats’ plan to encourage people to vote as safely as they can and you would have thought it was in the whole of America’s interest to do that?”

Reed can then be heard in the background saying ‘to cheat’, accusing Democrats of using mail-in voting to win the election.

Earlier in the interview Reed explained how in some states they stopped counting votes at a certain point in the night and they resumed in the morning. She said this was just as Trump was having a surge in results and that Democrats ‘did the math’ and saw Trump was going to win those states so they stopped counting votes.

Maitlis interjected and said: “What vote counting? They are still counting the votes, that’s the whole point, they are still counting a lot of votes.”

Reed continued with the same message and Maitlis added ‘I don’t even understand what you’re saying, they’ve been counting the votes’.

Viewers hailed Maitlis for her interviewing style with some calling her a ‘national treasure’.

One said: “Hats off to you last night on #Newsnight @maitlis . That woman was wired to the moon on conspiracies and your face during it was class. Dealt with through dignity and grace.”

While another added: "This is incredible. @maitlis is a bloody national treasure. Coverage on Americast has also been spot on."

Another wrote: “Peak @maitlis . A joy to see”

The best videos delivered daily

Watch the stories that matter, right from your inbox