2020 was a year when the world tried to make sense of catastrophic global pandemic, a painful racial reckoning, and the most politically divisive election season in modern American history. With 51% of Americans increasing their consumption of news amidst the coronavirus outbreak and nearly half checking the news multiple times a day,
ABC News covered this extraordinary and unrelenting year of news with distinction, guiding our audience through a constantly changing and often stressful world.

2020 truly was one of the most transformative in ABC News’ 75 year history, and this entry illustrates that in so many ways.

We developed a slate of innovative and culturally impactful long-form content, fearlessly embraced new technologies, vastly expanded our live streaming service, and created 150 hours of primetime content. and reached an increasingly diverse audience by building both a new race and culture team and several groundbreaking reporting initiatives across the news division. We focused in-depth primetime specials on diverse communities at the intersection of race, politics, culture and lifestyle. We implemented new hiring criteria. We completed the transformation of our studio to deliver to Americans our most modern and compelling election coverage yet.

Last year was also a record setting one for World News Tonight. In July, the broadcast was number one in all of television, topping every single show on broadcast and cable TV -- a first for any evening news program since Nielsen electronic ratings began in 1991.

We successfully achieved these goals amid the sudden overhaul of how we work and with 80% of our staff working remotely. As this year was like no other, we felt that our submission for the Edward R. Murrow Award for Overall Excellence needed to reflect that. Our 40 minute television entry focuses solely on COVID-19, race and the search for justice in America, and the 2020 presidential election.

Each piece in our entry is an example of storytelling not seen anywhere else. Many of the stories, including our news-dominating political interviews, in-depth documentary on the race for a COVID-19 vaccine, and Turning Point, our groundbreaking division-wide series on systemic racism featuring 120 distinct segments all illustrate our commitment to telling important stories over time.

As you will see with the rest of our entry below, ABC News took major steps forward as a news division in 2020 in the digital space. From our record-breaking, expanding ABC News Live streaming service, to a daily vertical video newscast exclusively for Facebook Watch, to cinematic short documentaries spanning the globe, chart topping podcasts and unmatched statistical analysis full of compelling political, scientific, and economic stories, our diverse digital platforms have given viewers unprecedented on-the-ground news coverage in real time, bringing every day Americans face-to-face with the human impact of the issues that shape their world.

The entry also includes our newscast submission, a special edition of World News Tonight. We chose May 27th, not for its location or a giant exclusive, but for its simplicity and true power focusing on the loved ones of some of the 100,000 lives lost to the pandemic. From the very start, David Muir and the team were committed to framing the numbers in terms of the human toll – mothers, fathers, grandparents, brothers and sisters. World News Tonight was the only broadcast to break from format and devote such a significant amount of time for reflection. The team worked together with the help of ABC affiliates to identify the pandemic’s victims and continued to do so for the grim milestones that were to follow.

ABC News respectfully submits a selection of our strongest original storytelling and news coverage for your consideration, and sincerely hope you find us deserving of the
2021 Edward R. Murrow Award for Overall Excellence.

ABC News Live Streaming Service

ABC News led the way in 2020 by fearlessly embracing new technologies to expand our global footprint and deliver more compelling on the ground stories. We enhanced ABC News Live in 2020 with a renewed focus on breaking news and a brand new look. But that was only the beginning. Despite working from home and navigating the global pandemic, the team debuted the hour-long broadcast Prime with Linsey Davis, while also adding hourly anchored news updates, special event coverage, a new political show and specials, including America's Future: The Power of the Latino Vote, The March on Washington, and Launch America: Mission to Space Live.

ABC News Live hit an all-time high in November with more than 96.1 million viewers. By Election Night an impressive 30% of ABC News’s viewership came from ABC News Live.

This is not your traditional evening news broadcast. Linsey Davis and her team peel back the onion every night, diving deeper into the day’s headlines.

For the first time in history, Latinos will be the largest minority racial or ethnic group in the electorate, with 32 million eligible voters. Recognizing the importance of one of the fastest growing voting groups in the United States, ABC News presented this hour-long special calling attention to the highs and lows of the Latino community during this unprecedented time. ABC News has long been committed to telling the stories of rarely-heard-from communities and we were incredibly proud to have our streaming channel elevate these voices. The special included captions and subtitles in Spanish on ABCNews.com, the ABC News app, and on Nat Geo’s Mundo broadcast in Spanish.

The climate crisis is described as the world's greatest existential threat, even more so than the ravaging pandemic. This looming nightmare is framed as if our world’s demise is inevitable. While the clock is ticking, meteorologically it’s not too late. It’s Not Too Late, a weekly series on ABC News Live Prime tackles everyday subjects and shows viewers that having the most basic knowledge is empowering.

On Location is a vertical video daily newscast, with new content for a new audience. The newscast utilizes ABC News’ seasoned and trusted journalists from around the globe as they deliver on-the-ground reporting on the top headlines, live events and in-depth interviews driving the day -- all experienced through Facebook Watch. Every day our On Location team finds creative new ways to take our Facebook Watch viewers right to the heart of the story. While we rely on our correspondents and producers in the field, we’ve enhanced our coverage by using material shot by our viewers. Since the pandemic started, On Location was watched for over 13.4 million minutes, a 230% increase. The episode that resonated with viewers the most featured Steve Osunsami's report on the pandemic’s toll on people of color (it is the first episode below) On Location doesn't put TV news on Facebook Watch. It makes ABC’s global news gathering social and puts it in front of viewers who don't typically turn on the television to get their news.

ABC News produces original digital documentaries which give viewers a personal and more complete understanding of complex issues flooding the news cycle. These digital features have spanned the globe, from the story of a life unjustly caught up in the Russian criminal justice system to, a sweeping film about an indigenous group in Brazil trying to save their forests, an investigation into white supremacy in the United States. We have included two digital documentaries from 2020 for your viewing:

This original documentary immerses viewers in the Amazon rainforest and an indigenous tribe's mission to protect a fragile ecosystem the planet depends on for survival, and captures its devastating toll on a vulnerable population..With unparalleled access, the film illustrates the powerful industrial interests, indifferent government agencies, and an ever-present fear of violent reprisals for those willing to risk their lives to protect an ecosystem we all depend on.

An investigation more than a year in the making, “Homegrown Hate: The War Among Us” seeks to answer the questions: Why has hate-inspired violence, intimidation and terror been allowed to proliferate in this country? How did we get to where we are today? What is the government doing to combat the imminent threat?

Collaborative Investigations

A year before Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi was killed inside the Saudi embassy in Turkey, a Raleigh, North Carolina-born journalist named Halla Barakat was brutally murdered alongside her mother in their Istanbul apartment. But unlike Khashoggi, whose death drew international attention, Barakat’s killing barely registered, marked by a U.S. State Department statement which misspelled her name and contained empty promises from senior Trump administration officials to make investigating her killing a top priority. Indeed, Halla’s death might have been completely forgotten were it not for a team of journalists from ABC News and Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting, who took up the case, doggedly conducting a sweeping investigation across two continents that raised new questions about the case.

GMA is #1 in Total Viewers for the 9th consecutive year and its digital presence is just as impressive. In 2020, goodmorningamerica.com nearly doubled our digital audience and also saw more than 8 billion impressions on social. As you will see from our examples below, the goodmorningamerica.com team dives deep into the biggest stories, putting their unique stamp on everything they do.

George Floyd’s death was one of so many disturbing and inequitable pattern of Black lives lost at the hands of law enforcement and in racially-charged incidents across the country. ABC News’ Deborah Roberts and the Good Morning America.com team brought together the mothers of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Botham Jean, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Antwon Rose and Trayvon Martin to talk openly about mourning their sons and daughters, their sacrifices as Black mothers in America, their children’s lives and tragic deaths, their legacies, and what justice means to them.

With 30 million unemployed and businesses shut down in nearly every state, Covid-19 quickly took a crippling toll on America's economic health. GMA and GMA.com made a commitment in early March to stand with and report on small businesses by sharing their stories along with ways Americans could support them. We connected more than 250 small businesses directly with our viewers. An outpouring of thanks flooded in. “What you have done for us in the last two weeks has course-corrected our business. During these really depressing times, both from a financial standpoint and a morale standpoint, you have been the brightest light”. - small business owner Bella Tunno

HerStory Lessons is a creative, compelling, fully animated series focused on women whose incredible life stories have not yet made a place in our living history. The series was made in partnership with ABC News Correspondent Deborah Roberts and launched during Women’s History Month in March.

ABC News is home to world-class on-demand content. In 2020, in addition to bringing viewers our flagship daily podcast Start Here and the acclaimed Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris, we premiered new podcasts including the chart-topping Truth and Lies: Jeffrey Epstein and Inside the Curve

Truth and Lies: Jeffrey Epstein is a nine-part investigative documentary podcast series that delves into the rise and fall of the multimillionaire sex trafficker. In brutally candid interviews, survivors of Epstein's abuse shared with us their stories of the lasting impact of his wealth, power, and cruelty.

These are first-person diaries from the people on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic - the essential workers risking their own health and safety to ensure others are taken care of. From doctors, nurses and paramedics to police officers, transportation and sanitation workers, listeners hear directly from those keeping the world moving while so many were quarantining at home and working to flatten the curve.

Data Driven Coverage & Statistical Analysis

FiveThirtyEight's comprehensive statistical analysis and data visualization was the go-to place for political coverage in the most historic and divisive election. FiveThirtyEight saw its biggest audience of all time on November 3, and its live blog became now the #1 article on record.

From the red mirage to the blue shift, FiveThirtyEight armed its readers, viewers and listeners with the information they needed to resist jumping to conclusions when the first vote results came in. The site was then among the first to quickly identify and clearly explain which way the vote was trending.

Election Forecast

FiveThirtyEight’s Election Day Live blog tracked results in real-time. Viewers were able to trace the path from either end to see which state could put one candidate over the top. The forecast updated at least once a day and again whenever they had a new poll Users were able to click to navigate the ways each candidate’s outlook has changed over time.

The Uncounted Dead

Bob Duffy died, at home, on March 29, 2020. Officially, the cause of death was chronic lung disease. But there was more going on than just that. A sudden illness had left him too fatigued to leave the house, and he had had contact with multiple people who later tested positive for COVID-19. Yet Bob’s death certificate doesn’t list that disease as a cause or even a probable cause of his death. He never got tested — he didn’t want to enter a hospital and be separated from Fran, his wife of 48 years. The question of who counts as a COVID-19 fatality became political – Bob’s death might never end up being attributed to SARS-CoV-2, but his death matters to the way we understand it.