When should you read a book like Unpresidented, the 2020 American presidential campaign diary by then BBC journo Jon Sopel? I started a long time ago, planning to interact with the book in the spirit in which it was meant: an election diary compiled at speed from daily entries. I was hoping to finish by Joe Biden’s inauguration. But then we all got distracted by the attack on the Capitol on 6 January. So I put the book away. Then the paperback came out, and I had another go. It was a good read but I wasn’t sure how to process it. It’s hard to know when to read the first draft of analysis when the circus is still rolling through town. Last week, the legal actions between Fox News and Dominion Voting Systems, about Fox’s coverage of the attacks, came to a close. This week, the British papers are covering Anthony Seldon’s snap analysis of Johnson at 10. It seems appropriate to reconsider Sopel’s tale from the trail as he tried to follow the man we might call ‘America Johnson’.
Both Johnson and Trump’s successors see themselves as the grown-ups clearing up the mess following the toddlers’ birthday parties. Sopel’s introduction to the hardback edition concedes the problem: ‘Let me make one prediction [of Biden’s administration] - journalistically it will be nothing like as story-rich or entertaining’. That in itself is a telling prediction: that an exhausted public would welcome government that presented itself as boring but competent. The distance of time means we know that that has only partially happened: in the US the temperature has barely dropped, and here the UK government is doing its best to stoke the culture war.
We always knew that this would not be the book the Sopel set out to write. The back of the updated paperback edition gives a hint. ‘Fear and loathing on the campaign trail…’ it purrs. And no one is better at fear and loathing than the participants of an American presidential election. But of course, this is a reference to the 1972 classic by Hunter S Thompson which applied the principles of ‘gonzo journalism’ to the genre. It’s fair to say that Sopel expected fireworks. An early tale describes bully-boy behaviour by snarling press aides towards the journalist pack. But all too quickly we are overtaken by the pandemic. We learn a lot about Sopel criss-crossing the globe or delivering interviews from a hotel wardrobe, but have fewer of the spittle-flecked encounters that we were perhaps expecting.
That’s not necessarily a problem. How many of those sorts of anecdotes do we really need? Perhaps we are all the better for reading Sopel’s attempts to make sense of it all in real time and remembering just how bewildering was the onslaught of the senses. It’s easy to forget just how bizarre the 2020 election campaign became: intertwined with the Trump administration’s chaotic response to the pandemic, layered with lockdown and the strange optics of socially distanced (or not) rallies. Sopel’s diaries will have some historical interest as our memories of that time fade. In 2023 we have both recent memory and perspective, and as Trump and Biden tease us about a 2024 rematch now is a good time to revisit the thrills, spills and pills of an election like no other.

After discovering him through the AmeriCast podcast, I knew I needed to read this diary/memoir following Jon Sopel of the BBC ("Here's another beauty") through the crazed year that was 2020. Based on his diary entries, this is full of "Sope"s voice. Great stuff!

I couldn't finish this book. I was wanting the dirt on Trump and the election, but it felt a bit self-indulgent to me. Not quite what I expected, unfortunately.

As a massive British politics nerd, American politics is something I've always been interested in, but at times struggled to understand - Jon Sopel is just the person to provide detailed analysis to a British audience in an unpatronising way. It is written in a very enjoyable and informal way, it truly his diaries, his inner most thoughts at the end of the day on the election trail. The only downside was that it finished! I do hope he keeps writing and gives us thoughts on the events that happened in the transition period and the beginning of Bidens presidency - possibly an idea for the paperback or a whole other book. Overall, a great read and I would highly recommend!

Jon Sopel is one of my favourite BBC reporters. Clever, incisive and witty. His USA election reports were generally spot on and this book follows his reporting style.
As BBC North American Editor he was on the election trail of the main candidates and there for the Covid pandemic and the presidency of Donald Trump.
His experience helps him delve below the surface and gives important insight into what he sees in the White House and the ongoing circus around it.
It’s fair to say he’s not a Trump devotee but he also didn’t hold back on Biden and others.
Enjoyable and informative read.
4.5 Stars ⭐️

Love Americast. Love Jon. Love UnPresidented. A really interesting insight into a crazy election year.
5 Stars

It was really interesting to read this account after the events which unfolded, leading up to the insurrection at the Capitol. It gave poignancy to Sopel's record. I didn't expect to have any eye-popping moments but I was wrong. A moreish read.

Despite the fact that I lived through all of these events and found them unbelievable somehow this book makes it even more unreal!

Donald Trump, President of America?? You have to be kidding me? I swear that if this was a fiction book it would be so unbelievable that no-one would buy it...but this actually happened!

Seeing it all again in print just reminds me of all of the drama that had recently unfolded and compare this with the aftermath of a new president that is strangely silent. As Jon Sopel intimates, never again will the press have such material to work with, and for that I am truly thankful l!!

A funny and insightful diary of the US election! Sopel always writes with a great combination of wit and accessibility, making you feel as though you are in the midst of the action.

Fascinating and impressively quickly published account of the 2020 election campaign by the BBC's North America editor. The campaign diary format gives it immediacy and, now that Biden is in the White House, reminds us how chaotic, surprising and plain bonkers the Trump presidency was. There are some drawbacks: Sopel is a bit too pleased with himself at times, the diary format necessarily allows little time for reflection and sometimes overstates Trump's ability (e.g. his "brilliant eye for the visual" is another observer's gift for cliche and camp). Overall though it's a detailed, eye witness account that will likely remain a useful reminder of a very strange year and a half.

I am quite a politics nerd. I worked at Westminster for 13 years and of course politics was wall to wall 24/7. There have been many occasions recently when I'd have wished I had been in Parliament again or even better to have had the chance to go to America and experience life there with 'the Donald' in charge (it's like driving past a motorway crash and insisting you won't look but then do)
So I was looking forward to Jon Sopel's book as he's one of the better experienced journalists for the BBC that cover North America and of course being there from 2014 has seen the transition from President Obama to President Trump.
Even now that he is not the President (sorry Donald but it's the truth) it is still hard to believe people could elect him as 45th leader of one of the most powerful countries in the world. But they did- and they did vote for him in huge numbers again in Nov 2020. But as Donald might say the votes for Joe Biden were even more bigly.....
There are diary entries by Sopel and you can clearly see the images in your mind - the rallies, the press conferences, the Trump family, all those people he hired and then fired at the White House. Sopel is a real insider and 'knows people' sources that are at the heart of the political machinery across both Republicans and Democrats so there's some interesting insights. It rattles along and you get a personal for the life of the journalist especially as the coronavirus traps him in Washington away from his family. Red wine and some well heeled friends seem occasionally to fill the void however!
But although it's a great re telling of the Trump story and the inner machinations of the Election campaign it fails dramatically at the end. Because it stops just as the victory is called for Biden getting over the 270 electoral college votes to win (sorry Donald a reminder you got less and lost)
Because it stops before
countless legal attempts to overturn the result
Trump sitting bunker like in the White House and refusing to concede
Biden and Kamala Harris behaving like leaders already
The move to impeach Trump for the second time
The Riot.
Yes it is the soap opera without the dum dum dum - but then we had the dumb dumb dumb and it won't be the last we hear of him
Even Jon Sopel must be kicking himself that the words in this book ran out.

I can safely say I’ve learned more about the US electoral system and its political structure in general over the last few months than in the entire rest of my life. Before, during and particularly after the 2020 election, like - I suspect - many others in the UK, I’ve been glued to the US news in an exhausting combination of anxiety, elation, disbelief and horror. Sopel himself remarks that as lockdown 2 was kicking in, “millions in Britain are at home and seemingly taking a ludicrously unhealthy interest in the US elections”. Yes - I was one of them.

That being so, I was interested to read Jon Sopel’s first hand account of the election, which he describes in an introductory note as “the journalistic assignment of a lifetime”. Indeed it is. Sadly, the diary ends with Biden’s victory and doesn’t cover the even more dramatic events that unfolded between then and the inauguration, as an increasingly desperate president attempted to set fire to democracy to protect his ego and avoid being a loser. A whole book could certainly be written about those two and a half months, and no doubt several will.

Having followed the election pretty closely there weren’t many events which I didn’t already know at least a bit about (which didn’t stop me being horrified anew on countless occasions) but it was interesting and insightful to see it from the point of view of the man on the spot. (Well, some of the time he was on the spot. The pandemic is an ever-present backdrop.)

I’ve never been able to understand how Trump manages to inspire so much devoted support, but Sopel’s book does shed a tiny bit of light on this, referring to his energy and ability to engage with a crowd. It’s alarming to consider how much support he still has in spite of everything - and had it not been for his disastrous handling of the pandemic it’s certainly possible that he could indeed have won the election. Maybe even BY A LOT.

UnPresidented (great title) is a fascinating read, and Sopel has a great way with words and spot-on observations, at times making me laugh out loud (for instance, “a lot of what [Trump] says comes out as an anagram of a properly constructed sentence”).

The presidency of Donald Trump and particularly the last few months have been a wild ride, often horrifying, always interesting. Many words have been and will continue to be written about a bizarre period of history. But, writing this a few days after the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, I can’t be the only one who’s hoping the new administration will
bring a healthy dose of calmness. Maybe even a little boredom. How refreshing would that be?

I admit that even though it was all happening on a different continent, thousands of miles away, I was pretty much hooked on events leading up to and during the 2020 United States presidential election. It made all UK elections look bland and boring by comparison and I have to say that there is always something entertaining about Trump, no matter how little sense he sometimes makes. Jon Sopel is a respected British journalist and currently BBC’s North America editor, and as such he makes regular appearances on BBC news programmes. His updates always feel like they are on point and often they’re also wryly amusing. In addition, I’d enjoyed Sopel’s 2017 book If Only They Didn’t Speak English: Notes from Trump’s America, so sourcing a copy of this one was really a complete no-brainer.

The book takes the form of a series of diary entries, or postings, in which Sopel updates his thoughts as events unfold. After a brief introduction he kicks off with the Iowa Democratic presidential caucuses, in February, and then runs right through to the voting itself in early November. Throughout, it’s pretty clear what he thinks of Trump - i.e. not a lot! - and this conveyed something similar the effect you get from listening to one of the CNN’s daily newscasts. I suppose this is fairly predictable given the journalist’s history with Trump, who had famously referred to Sopel as ‘another beauty’ (this not meant in a good way) when he stood to ask a question during a White House news conference a couple of years back. And so perhaps this whole enterprise is tinged with a certain amount of inbuilt bias, except that each update is supported by enough background information to allow readers to make up their own minds as to whether this is the case. For the record, I found him to be thorough in his analysis and highly logical in his conclusions.

But Biden doesn’t totally escape the author’s scorn either, he’s presented as boring, gaff ridden and virtually invisible for the majority of the campaign. In one telling episode, he watches as Biden looks to stir up support at an event assisted by ex-president Barack Obama and reflecting on their former working relationship states that it’s no surprise that Biden was number two. And even the UK’s Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, comes in for his share of criticism here – this for his ‘lackadaisical’ handling of the coronavirus crisis. Yes, I think it’s fair to say that Sopel hands out a few more kicks to the groin than he does pats on the back.

My overall impression of this compressed version of the campaign is that of refreshed amazement at just how much happened in the course of ten months, and also just how bizarre the whole thing was. In a way there’s little here that I wasn’t previously aware of but it’s a story that is very well told and consequently thoroughly engrossing. I’d recommend this book to anyone who has an interest politics or in recent history – but please beware if you’re a Trump supporter, it might just increase your blood pressure to medically unsafe levels.

Jon Sopels excellent journalism shines at the forefront once again. Although, even Sopel admits that he did not see the Trump events of 2020 coming. The storming of the Capitol is not so remarkable reading these pages as Sopel makes it clear that tensions were on the rise. Sopel pairs his incredible insight and political analysis alongside good humour to make this a really engaging read.

An intelligent and probing reflection on the USA 2021 elections; the impact of coronavirus on political campaigning and the struggle to vote in person.
Jon Sopel, Mr Reliable, the BBC’s Johnny-on-the-spot is a safe political journalist to guide us through the final days of the Trump administration.

In simple bite-size pieces the author’s management of words and expansive vocabulary fills this diary with gems of observation, balanced insights and many a humorous aside. The writing is clear and factual. Never over-wordy or rambling out of control.

While it has the structure of the election process it is far more than the daily chore of being somewhere, doing a piece to camera and journalistic backslapping. While Sopel is his own man, by default of his own fears and being caught up in the pandemic ,makes for a more human story to be reported that sits well beside his professional duties.

You find yourself warming to a man, concerned about his family, isolation, thanking supportive friends who helped him through and never self absorbed in his image as an important, or crusading journalist. He reports what he sees, he is fair and balanced and never demanding of others to acknowledge his status. I liked his general assessment of Donald Trump, no-one really could predict how it would unfold but Sopel is spot-on regarding how Trump might react in defeat.

A bonus of this political masterpiece is the record of America’s own response to COVID and an impartial summary of how the White House often struggled to respond to this global assault. Our man in Washington is indeed a safe pair of hands and a voice worth listening to on these unbelievable times.

Although a book like this could be over edited benefitting with hindsight, the beauty of this book is that it was written very much in real time. That for me makes for a special energy and immediacy to the comments. It means that the woeful period of transition of power isn’t covered - but that was not the book’s remit. The storming of the Capitol is not so remarkable reading these pages, sadly, the author cannot write a postscript “I told you so!”

What I especially like about this man, Jon Sopel is his humanity and his generous spirit. He has rivalries of course, but he seems never to find fault in others; friends, family and fellow members of the media are held in high regard and with great esteem.

This book is a wonderful peep behind the curtain of a unique time in American history. Thank you Jon for your insights and I wish you well with you day job.

The BBC’s remit is to "Inform, Educate & Entertain" and Jon Sopel as the North America Editor succeeds at achieving all three of these valuable endeavours in his latest book. His diary entries show the challenges of reporting the facts in a time of a chaotic administration, civil unrest and a brutal pandemic. The run up to the 2020 Presidential election and the aftermath is anything but predictable. Seeing through the American looking class is an interesting and sometimes chaotic experience but mostly due to the sheer incompetence of the administration of the 45th President it’s a bewildering experience.

Sopel’s writing style is easy going and genuine, like a friend telling you a story but one that that seems too strange to be real. But as he’s a trustworthy narrator you know it is. I was eagerly awaiting the publication of UnPresidented for several months, so I was elated to receive a review copy, and it was worth the wait.

I thought Unpresidented was excellent – and far more interesting and involving than I expected. It is in the form of extracts from Jon Sopel’s journal of the 2020 Presidential Election, starting about 18 months out and ending as Biden and Harris make their victory speeches. It is vivid, insightful and – for me – increasingly gripping as the extraordinary events of 2020 unfold.

Sopel writes very well. I have always found his reporting for the BBC interesting and penetrating and the book has the same qualities, but magnified rather because he is less restrained by the requirements of impartiality. He manages to be objective (although rabid Trump-worshippers probably wouldn’t agree), but is able to point out more forcibly (and often wryly and wittily) some of the absurdities and outrageous behaviour of the Trump administration. He is also able to give a lot more inside information from off-the-record conversations which make the picture all the richer (and often, all the more horrifying). Most people, like me, will remember much of what is described in the book, but having it brought so vividly to life and so shrewdly dissected made this very fresh for me and I ended up wanting to read more to see what happened next.

I found the impact of all this very powerful. A very potent picture emerges of Trump’s behaviour as a man who is interested only in himself, in being adulated by supporters and in being seen as a “winner.” Sopel points out, for example, that a news conferences when over a thousand Americans are dying every day from Covid-19, Trump never addresses this but is interested only in speaking about how mean the media are to him. The context of the pandemic makes the lies and utter lack of principle deeply shocking and the picture of the USA so bitterly divided – especially over race – is stark. Sopel also makes clear that Trump is a formidable figure who is extremely powerful, vindictive, intolerant of any dissent or of anyone who takes his limelight, and possessed of phenomenal energy. The last four years seem much more clearly focussed in my mind after reading this book.

I read and am writing this in the period between the storming of the Capitol building by Trump supporters and the inauguration of Joe Biden. It is a time of extreme tension and we will see what happens next. In the meantime, I found this picture of how the USA arrived at this point to be excellently painted and wholly gripping. I very rarely read political books, but I can recommend this on very warmly indeed.

(My thanks to Ebury for an ARC via NetGalley.)

"UnPresidented" is basically Jon Sopel's diary of the 2020 US election race, the election, and a few days after. Sounds dull? It's anything but. Jon Sopel handles the events (public and personal) with a great deal of humanity that makes this book impossible to dislike in any way. I'd been following the election quite closely, but even so, there were things I'd missed hearing about. Vital reading for enthusiasts of politics, the USA, or humankind in general.

My thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley. This review was written voluntarily and is entirely my own, unbiased, opinion.

I have just finished “Unpresidented” which has taken over my life for the last week or so. What a rollercoaster of a read. it provides a forensic close up view of the US election written by the BBC's eminent Washington correspondent who is always close to the action - sometimes a bit too close at times given the COVID scares. If it was fiction it would be laughed out of court given how totally incredible what has transpired over the past few months. You really could not make much of this up.

This is the third of a trilogy of books by Jon Sopel and it completes a truly important body of work. it is extremely prescient in how it predicts that Trump will respond in the face of defeat and I just hope and pray there isn’t a final chapter still to be written given last week's storming of the Capital.