A Brief History of US Election Scandals

Professor Peter J Ling is coming to Portsmouth Guildhall on Tuesday 9 February, 7pm, to talk about US presidential scandals from Watergate to Trump. He's an Emeritus Professor of American Studies at the University of Nottingham, and the talk is part of the Portsmouth Historical Association's series of talks.

Ling draws on his 2024 book After Watergate, which traces presidential scandals across the last half-century. He starts with Watergate itself, which began as an election campaign scandal, and follows the controversies that came after. Among them are the Florida count of 2000, Russian interference in 2016, and what Trump calls the 'rigged election' of 2020, alongside continuous efforts to manipulate all phases of the process for partisan advantage. He frames it as a historical topic with contemporary resonances.

It's a long stretch of American political history to cover in one evening, and Ling works his way through it by treating Watergate as the starting point rather than a one-off. The talk is held in Room 1.09 of the Park Building on King Henry I Street, PO1 2BZ. Entry is £4 per lecture, or £20 for all the lectures from October to May; students and HA members pay nothing.