With reports that phones within the Harris and Trump campaigns had been targeted by Chinese hackers, a new support system has been announced to take US journalists through the post-election period.

Safety – including digital defence from online threats and cybersecurity – is among focus areas of ‘Election Urgent Care’ being delivered by a coalition led by Knight Election Hub, Votebeat and Hearken.

Programme director at Knight and Newspack ‘entrepreneur in residence’ Scott Klein says journalists may face unexpected challenges following the US election, with the team helping newsrooms continue to provide essential information to their communities during the post-election transfer of power.

The Election Urgent Care team will also focus on physical security, provide legal assistance – both with advice and legal representation “where possible” – journalistic background advice on how to cover unexpected tactics and events related to election administration, document and data gathering, ‘data wrangling’ and analysis for newsrooms that lack data journalism capacity, and other services as needed.

But Klein emphasises, “the programme is not for partisan organisations”, and says it will not provide direct funding to newsrooms or provide editorial content.

Newsrooms covering US elections are invited to apply for access to the Votebeat Expert Desk/Election Urgent Care Slack, and can also connect at urgentcare@electionsos.org.

“We’ve learned a lot about how to connect organisations providing resources to help cover the election and newsrooms that need the help,” he said. “We’re going to take what we’ve learned as well as the connections we’ve made in newsrooms to offer help to newsrooms in need during the potential tumult on and after November 5.”

Among organisations working as communication partners are the American Press Institute, the Center for Cooperative Media, the National Association of Broadcasters, the Institute for Nonprofit News, Radio Television Digital News Association and Trusting News.