In April 2015, Sexton started covering the 2016 U.S. presidential election, attending multiple rallies for both major candidates and writing regular articles for "Atticus Review" in his column "Atticus on the Trail". He covered the Charleston shooting and trail of church burnings in the South. In the summer of 2016, Sexton went to another Trump rally in South Carolina, and reported on the behavior he observed there. His live tweets of the event soon went viral and garnered him national attention, which included frequent death threats. He later wrote about the experience and became a regular contributor to "The New Republic" and "The New York Times."