French elections during the pandemic – Estelle Cognacq, Franceinfo

We spoke with Estelle Cognacq, news director of the newsroom with the radio network called Franceinfo, about French municipal elections, which were held in two rounds in March and June 2020, and discussed the impact of the pandemic on many aspects of the electoral process in this country.

In our conversation we focused on topics such as voters turnout in a pandemic and their perception of the election process, how did the pandemic affect the results of the municipal elections, as well as misinformation during the campaign and many others.

Estelle joined franceinfo in 2012 as editor in chief of franceinfo.fr and then became editor in chief of l’agence franceinfo in 2016. Since 2018, she has been deputy news director at franceinfo, in charge of l’agence franceinfo, the in-house department created to check and certify the news, the fact-checking team and the online redaction. Previously she worked for Lagardère (media group). She started as a reporter for Europe 1 (radio) and europe1.fr, after which she became head of the editorial for europe1.fr, and three other news websites (jdd.fr, parismatch.com and Le Lab).