At Epicenter, we believe that news and information should meet people where they already are: Not just on our website or in their inbox, but in the spaces where our communities connect every day. With early voting underway and Election Day on Tuesday, Nov. 3, easy access to accurate voter information is critical to combating misinformation. That includes the platforms that people already use, like text and AI tools.
So we’re trying something new this election season. Text or WhatsApp your election questions to 347-252-9070 and get answers drawn from our reporting and trusted URL Media partner newsrooms participating in this pilot. Answers come from coverage and sources we’ve vetted, not the open web, and connect you back to our newsrooms.
Our communities are already asking AI
Pew Research Center found that 8% of U.S. adults are already using AI chatbots for 2026 election information, rising to 11% of adults under 50. Among those users, 71% are checking whether something they heard or read is accurate, and 40% are looking for registration, polling place or vote-by-mail information.
People are already typing those questions into ChatGPT, Claude or Google search and Gemini. So the question isn’t whether our communities will turn to AI this election. It’s whether the answers they get come from sources they know and trust. This pilot is the bridge: a responsible way to make sure that when our neighbors ask, our local reporting is part of the answer. We are here to make sure AI is working in service of our communities, not the other way around.
On the apps our communities already use
One in three U.S. adults uses WhatsApp, and use is far higher in communities of color: 56% of Hispanic adults, 51% of English-speaking Asian adults and 40% of Black adults, compared with 24% of white adults. For many of the families we serve, WhatsApp is where the group chats, the family updates and the community news already live. It’s why Mayor Mamdani launched El Chisme Oficial de NYC, a Spanish-language channel connecting New Yorkers with City Hall.
Our Elections 2026 by URL Media chatbot is another door into our reporting and URL Media partners’ coverage. It doesn’t replace our reporters, and it doesn’t write new stories. Whether you’re searching through our website, finding information on, scrolling through social media posts or watching TikTok videos, you, our neighbors, will have one more place to access verified information from the team they’ve trusted since the pandemic.
How it works
Epicenter NYC is leading this pilot in partnership with URL Media, a national network of independent media organizations and creators serving diverse communities. Six URL Media partner newsrooms have joined the pilot: AsAmNews, Documented, India Currents, Native News Online, The Electorette and The Oklahoma Eagle. Their voter guides and election coverage, alongside ours, power every answer.
The tool runs on Suwali, a community dialogue platform built by Meedan, a global nonprofit technology organization that has powered several election projects and also runs our health chatbot. It answers only from the sources and reporting we connect to it, never the open web. You can ask about the voting process and the issues on your ballot leading up to Election Day on Nov. 3.
We want your honest feedback. It won’t be perfect – we know this
Since we started this project, we’ve known the value of our team’s original reporting and that technology including AI will never be perfect. There will be questions the chatbot can’t answer and moments where it falls short. That’s exactly why we’re doing it now – to learn and see how we can improve to better serve you.
This is a chance for us to learn. What you ask, how you ask it, which issues keep coming up and where the gaps are will shape how Epicenter and our URL partners serve voters after the midterms and in future elections. It will guide the stories we choose to cover and the guardrails we build to keep humans in the loop. It will also show us what this work really takes. Smaller community newsrooms don’t have the resources of larger ones, and we need tools that work for us to better serve you.
AI is moving fast. For the sake of how we inform and connect communities to resources, we need to test these projects so we can build our future.
How to share your feedback
Your feedback is the most valuable part of this pilot. Tell us what was useful, where it let you down and what you wish it could answer. Our team will review how the chatbot responds, but users are not identified. You can reach me or email hello at epicenter-nyc.com to share your feedback.
Try it now: Go text or WhatsApp 347-252-9070 and ask away.
