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In particular, state media has focused on protests in American cities, beginning this summer with the Black Lives Matter demonstrations, through protests around the elections, as proof that American democracy is chaotic.
After Biden won Pennsylvania and therefore the presidency, CCTV, the state broadcaster, broadcast video of large crowds in Philadelphia on Saturday night and a heavy police presence. One presenter stated that there have been “not only verbal attacks but also physical confrontations” between Trump and Biden supporters. (Actually, there were few reports of violent clashes.)
Hu Xijin, editor of the Global Times, noted Trump’s refusal to admit, writing on Weibo, a platform similar to Twitter, that “American society is now deeply divided, creating the ground for further political derailment.”
The media had been emphasizing the potential for political violence all week as the vote counts progressed. Since Election Day, Chinese state media have shared photos of boarded up businesses and police officers on duty at polling sites.
At the time the race was called, the second-most trending topic on Weibo was the car shooting of two people attending a pro-Trump rally in Florida on Friday. Few publications mentioned that the shots were rounds of pellets, or that the two people were treated for minor injuries and released.
Some state-controlled media seemed to revel in the instability. Just minutes before the race for Biden was called on Saturday, People’s Daily, the official spokesperson for the Chinese Communist Party, had mocked Trump’s stated refusal to accept the election results.
Trump, about an hour earlier, falsely tweeted that he had won the election. The People’s Daily account retweeted that post, adding the comment, “HaHa” and a laughing emoji.
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