America’s Great Divide: From Obama to Trump
Mon., Jan. 13 & Tues., Jan. 14, 2020, at 9/8c on PBS and online
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As the 2020 election year dawns, America is a country deeply divided. A decade that began with a president who promised national unity is ending with his successor facing impeachment and an electorate that’s been described as more polarized than at any other time since the Civil War.

In America’s Great Divide: From Obama to Trump, a four-hour special series that comes to PBS Mon., Jan. 13 and and Tues., Jan. 14, FRONTLINE investigates how we got here — offering American television’s most comprehensive look at the divisive politics of the past decade, and what they mean for the new and pivotal one that’s beginning.

Providing gripping and crucial context for the present moment, America’s Great Divide traces the growth of a toxic political environment that has paralyzed Washington and dramatically deepened the gulf between Americans — and holds political leaders across two presidencies accountable for their role.

“The country is at a crossroads — and we can’t move forward unless we understand what brought us to this moment,” says FRONTLINE filmmaker Michael Kirk (The Choice 2016), a veteran chronicler of U.S. politics who with his team has made nearly 20 documentaries on the Obama and Trump administrations. “In this special series, we’ve identified key turning points in the development of America’s increasingly bitter, divided and toxic politics, laying out essential history and new insights for the public as this consequential election year begins.”

America’s Great Divide draws on dozens of revelatory new interviews with political and cultural figures including top Obama aides Ben Rhodes and David Axelrod, former Fox News host Megyn Kelly, and onetime Trump advisers Steve Bannon, Cliff Sims and Sam Nunberg. It also features a vast archive of in-depth interviews conducted by FRONTLINE as the past decade unfolded, with key policymakers including then-Vice President Joe Biden and former Speaker of the House John Boehner.

Over the course of its four hours, the series reveals how partisan power plays in Washington, social media, racial resentment, right-wing media, and left-wing late-night scorn all came together to deepen the country’s divisions — and how now, even the idea of truth itself has become a part of America’s Great Divide.

Episode One, premiering Mon., Jan. 13, traces how Barack Obama’s promise of unity collapsed as increasing racial, cultural and political divisions frustrated his administration and laid the groundwork for the rise of Donald Trump. The episode details the backlash against Obama’s controversial health care reform, the growth of a powerful right-wing media “outrage machine,” and the simmering racial strife and nationalism Obama’s presidency brought to the surface. As Obama became a divisive figure and turned to executive actions, the documentary shows how the mantle of opposition passed from the Republican establishment to more radical “Tea Party” forces targeting the leadership of both parties, and representing angry voters whom Trump would call “the forgotten.”

Episode One reveals how ultimately, by the end of his presidency, Obama questioned his once-guiding belief in Americans’ ability to find common ground: “You know, what if we were wrong?’” Ben Rhodes recalls him saying.

Episode Two of America’s Great Divide, premiering Jan. 14, goes on to examine how Trump’s campaign understood and exploited the country’s divisions, and how President Trump’s attacks on the institutions of government, on immigrants, critics and the news media have both reflected the nation’s divide — and deepened it.

The documentary shows how the man who had fed conflict on reality TV applied that same approach on a much larger political stage, and how his message was amplified by right-wing media — in particular, Breitbart News, which went to battle on Trump’s behalf under the leadership of Trump’s future campaign manager and senior adviser Steve Bannon.

Episode Two examines how, in today’s American politics, exploiting division is a path to power. The film puts into fresh context a Russian disinformation campaign, the president’s takeover of the Republican Party, his use of Twitter as a cudgel against his perceived enemies, and how he has gone to war with the press and the public over what is true.

“What he’s really good at in a fight is muddying the waters, muddying the truth, muddying the focus to the point where everybody just says, ‘Eh, it’s a wash,’” says Matt Bai, journalist and author of The Argument.

As impeachment proceedings and the 2020 election loom, the series asks tough questions about what America’s divisions mean for the future.

“No matter who is elected president next,” Wesley Lowery of The Washington Post says, “they are going to face and have to grapple with this deep divide in America, and that could shape their entire presidency.”

“Politics isn’t a game,” longtime GOP pollster Frank Luntz says in an emotional interview. “It’s not just for who’s alive today, it’s for what we will be 50 or 100 years from now. And I don’t think we think of the consequences.”

Gripping and thoughtful, America’s Great Divide: From Obama to Trump offers crucial big-picture context for the election year that’s about to unfold. In tandem with the premiere, and as part of the FRONTLINE Transparency Project, FRONTLINE will publish a digital collection in video and text of nearly 30 extended interviews that were conducted for the making of the series — offering in-depth accounts of history unfolding.

America’s Great Divide: From Obama to Trump premieres Mon., Jan. 13 and Tues, Jan. 14 at 9 p.m. E.S.T/8 p.m. C.S.T. Tune in or stream on PBS (check local listings), at pbs.org/frontline, on the PBS Video App and on YouTube.  

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Credits

America’s Great Divide: From Obama to Trump is a FRONTLINE Production with Kirk Documentary Group, Ltd. The director is Michael Kirk. The producers are Michael Kirk, Mike Wiser, Jim Gilmore, Gabrielle Schonder, and Philip Bennett. The writers are Michael Kirk and Mike Wiser. The reporters are Jim Gilmore and Gabrielle Schonder. The executive producer of FRONTLINE is Raney Aronson-Rath.

About FRONTLINE
FRONTLINE, U.S. television’s longest running investigative documentary series, explores the issues of our times through powerful storytelling. FRONTLINE has won every major journalism and broadcasting award, including 91 Emmy Awards and 22 Peabody Awards. Visit pbs.org/frontline and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Tumblr and Google+ to learn more. FRONTLINE is produced by WGBH Boston and is broadcast nationwide on PBS. Funding for FRONTLINE is provided through the support of PBS viewers and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Major funding for FRONTLINE is provided by The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Ford Foundation. Additional funding is provided by the Abrams Foundation, the Park Foundation, the John and Helen Glessner Family Trust, the Heising-Simons Foundation and the FRONTLINE Journalism Fund with major support from Jon and Jo Ann Hagler on behalf of the Jon L. Hagler Foundation.

Press Contact: frontlinemedia@wgbh.org, 617.300.5312