The Afghanistan Papers/A Secret History of the War
The Washington Post obtained and reported on a confidential trove of interviews conducted by the federal government with more than 400 people who played a direct role in the war in Afghanistan. The more than 2,000 pages of documents, pried loose after a three-year public records battle, reveal that presidents, generals and diplomats have misled the public about the conflict for nearly two decades. After publication, the story drew major attention from world leaders, U.S. presidential candidates, the Pentagon, military veterans, and the media. Congress has held several hearings to review the Afghanistan Papers and question federal officials about their handling of the war, with some legislators calling for the U.S. to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan.
In October 2018, federal law enforcement agents in Oregon suspected the Saudi Arabian government had helped one of its citizens, a young college student studying in Portland, flee the United States weeks before his trial in the hit-and-run death of a teenage girl. Based on a tip about this case, a reporter for The Oregonian newspaper uncovered a pattern of similar cases around the country, some dating back decades. In response, Oregon’s senior Senator introduced a bill that forces U.S. intelligence officials to disclose what they know about the Saudi Arabian government’s suspected role in spiriting its citizens out of the United States to escape criminal prosecution. The bill was signed into law in December, 2019.
This NBC News investigation revealed that carbon monoxide detectors are not required in any of 4.6 million homes that receive federal rental subsidies from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, despite HUD’s legal mandate to ensure these properties are “decent, safe and sanitary.” The investigation uncovered that at least 13 HUD residents have died from CO poisoning since 2003. Less than two weeks after the investigation was published, the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives introduced bills requiring CO detectors in public housing. In September 2019, the House passed a bill requiring detectors and $300 million in funding to install them, citing NBC News’ reporting. The bill is currently working its way through the Senate, with strong support from the Trump administration.
Kaiser Health News revealed that, for nearly 20 years, the FDA struck deals with medical device makers to keep millions of malfunction and injury reports out of a trusted public database relied upon by doctors, researchers, and patients for information about injuries, deaths or malfunctions linked to breast implants, surgical mesh, artificial knees and hundreds of other medical products. Instead, the FDA allowed companies to submit these reports to an internal database so obscure that it was unknown to safety experts, doctors, and even a recent FDA commissioner. As a result of this reporting, the FDA published its entire hidden database online in June 2019, revealing 5.7 million device-related injuries or malfunctions for the first time.
A first-of-its-kind investigation, by the Anchorage Daily News in partnership with ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network, uncovered major gaps in law enforcement that placed residents at risk. Their reporting found that one in three Alaska communities have no local police of any kind, the state of Alaska has failed to enforce police hiring requirements and some villages routinely hire criminals as cops, and state Troopers are patrolling suburban areas at the expense of hard-to-reach villages. As a result of this reporting, the Department of Justice declared a national emergency and has promised more than $52 million in federal funding for public safety in Alaska villages.
The winner of the 2020 Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting was “Copy. Paste. Legislate” by the staffs of The Arizona Republic, USA TODAY, and the Center for Public Integrity. The collaborative reporting team conducted unprecedented computer analysis of legislation in all 50 states to reveal 10,000 bills that were copied nearly word-for-word from text written by industry groups, lobbyists and political activists, often to benefit big business at consumers’ expense. Two tools built as part of the project are helping citizens and local reporters track these copycat bills in their own communities.
The Wall Street Journal uncovered evidence that Donald Trump personally orchestrated a criminal scheme to suppress damaging sexual allegations, despite denials by the president. The revelations implicated Trump in a felony, triggered criminal and congressional investigations and amplified calls for his impeachment. Journal reporters revealed secret payoffs made during the 2016 presidential campaign by Trump and his associates to two women who both alleged they had affairs with the then-candidate. The coverage sparked a federal criminal investigation into campaign-finance abuses that will soon land the president’s longtime lawyer in prison, and broke open Washington’s most consequential and far-reaching scandal of the year.
Reporting from the South Bend Tribune and ProPublica revealed deep flaws and abuses of power in the criminal justice system in Elkhart, Indiana – from new revelations in the wrongful convictions of two men, to the promotions of police supervisors with serious disciplinary records, to the mishandling of police misconduct cases. The investigation led to the resignation of the police chief, criminal charges against two officers and plans for an independent investigation of the department, demonstrating the strong, immediate impact that investigative journalism can have at the local level – and its ability to force critical changes in communities.
ProPublica obtained and published a secret recording from inside a border patrol detention center that captured the sounds of children, recently separated from their families at the Mexican border, sobbing and begging for their parents. The audio clip was played on the floors of Congress, sparking widespread condemnation and having an almost immediate impact, with President Trump signing an executive order to end the family separation policy within 48 hours of its publication. ProPublica reporters then dug deeper into conditions at the detention centers, detailing abuse and assaults on immigrant children, directly countering the administration’s claims that the shelters were safe havens.
The Philadelphia Inquirer revealed unsafe conditions in Philadelphia’s rundown public schools, with children forced to learn in buildings rife with mold, asbestos and flaking and peeling lead paint. By scouring maintenance logs and conducting scientific testing inside 19 elementary schools, and engaging teachers and parents in their reporting, the Inquirer built a comprehensive database of the shocking conditions putting children at risk on a daily basis. The investigation prompted the state and school district to direct millions of dollars to emergency cleanup of lead paint and asbestos fibers in schools, the total demolition and planned replacement of one school with particularly deplorable conditions, and a new law protecting children from lead paint and other serious health hazards in public schools.
