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Global Audiences Received In-Depth VOA Coverage of President Trump's Speech to Congress


VOA Indonesian's Patsy Widakuswara going live from the Russell Senate building Rotunda, February 28, 2017.
VOA Indonesian's Patsy Widakuswara going live from the Russell Senate building Rotunda, February 28, 2017.

As President Donald Trump was delivering his first address before the U.S. Congress, the Voice of America was live across platforms, with many of its 47 language services offering simultaneous translations of the speech for their regional audiences. At the same time VOA’s main website, voanews.com, offered live simultaneous translations of the speech in four languages: Russian, Mandarin, Persian and Spanish.

Here are some additional highlights:

VOA Global English teamed up with the News Center to provide live radio coverage for English speaking audiences around the world. Host Doug Bernard was joined by National Correspondent Jim Malone, White House correspondent Steve Herman and Capitol Hill correspondents Katherine Gypson and Michael Bowman for analysis and perspective. More than a dozen stations across Africa also picked up the coverage.

Spanish Service affiliate stations throughout the region aired President Trump’s speech with simultaneous translation on television and radio and linked to VOA Spanish Facebook live broadcast. Approximately 17 major television networks and 16 radio stations in the hemisphere covered the events through Voice of America. As a result of big affiliate referrals nearly 12 million Facebook followers were reached and over 160,000 people viewed the broadcast.

VOA Russian was live on the Current Time channel with a one hour-45-minute Current Time America TV special featuring President Trump's speech and the Democratic response with simultaneous translation and expert commentary, as well as live remotes from the Capitol Hill Rotunda and protests in Washington, DC. The event was viewed more than 100,000 times on Facebook with more than 1,000 comments. VOA Ukrainian was the only media outlet in Ukraine to carry the speech live with simultaneous translation on digital platforms. It had more than 20,000 views on Facebook.

VOA Persian produced and aired two hours and fifteen minutes of Live TV special coverage of the President’s address to Congress with correspondent reports from the White House, the Capitol Rotunda, and the VOA building roof and guest analysts, in the DC studio and via satellite remotes. On social media alone, full video of the POTUS address, along with short video excerpts on Facebook, Instagram and Telegram garnered over 386,000 views.

In addition to live streaming the speech with simultaneous translation on Facebook, VOA’s Deewa Service interviewed several prominent members of Congress, like Senator Bob Corker (R-TN), Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA), and U.S. Representative Ted Lieu (D-CA) who commented on the President’s address.

Lastly, VOA Indonesian provided 15 live hits for TV affiliates, including CNN Indonesia and 20 other radio affiliates.

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