October - 2017

My Stories

How Repealing Obamacare Really Hurts In Kentucky, And The Political Price For The GOP

What would repealing the Affordable Care Act of cutting Medicaid mean for people in the red state of Kentucky, and would Mitch McConnell and the GOP face political consequences from their own voters if they succeeded in ending Obamacare? I teamed up with Kentucky public radio reporter Lisa Gillespie to find out in this piece for Kaiser Health News. "Tricia Petrucci hasn’t quite reached the point where she regrets her vote for President Donald Trump. It would be understandable

What Happens When A Senator Locks The Door On Constituents

I wanted to capture the tension between Republican senators who were on the fence over various Affordable Care Act repeals and constituents who were afraid of losing coverage. So I grabbed my camera and mic, and went to the Hill early one day for Now This Politics, looking for people who wanted to confront their senators. I settled on a group headed for Sen. Shelley Moore Capito's office. Capito has always struck me as a reasonable person, but in this case she had instructed

Trump Voters Explain What Really Matters

I won't say I saw Donald Trump's victory coming, but when I went out on the trail to cover a couple events and talk to his supporters, I began to realize how it was possible for him to win, why the coverage of his many problems didn't matter, and why Democrats and liberals should take Trump more seriously. As I concluded in story: "Perhaps what liberals should be most concerned about is not the comments that Trump voters make about race, foreigners and women, but the underlyi

How Lobbyists Use Congressional Dysfunction To Pass Laws And Undermine Rules, Making An Entire Indus

No one who doesn't make money in trucking wants to see safety rules weakened, yet the industry has managed to chip away at protective standards for the last several years by getting Congress to attach laws that do that to giant emergency spending bills. There are no hearings or open committee markups before industry-sponsored provisions wind up in last-second bills to keep the government running. The effort coincides with a steady rise in truck crashes that injure or kill mor

Congress And Trump Are Endangering The Census -- America's $220 Billion Secret Economic Weapon

The Census is not the sexiest subject in the world. Yet the information it provides underpins vast amounts of information that business, the government and the economy all depend on to function. It is also at serious risk right now of either being done poorly or at exorbitant cost. Explaining that in a way that gets through the noise of the modern news cycle is not easy, yet this story doing just that was read by more than a million people. WASHINGTON ― When most people think

Why Jon Stewart Fought So Hard After 9/11 -- And What It Says About Congress

I've covered 9/11 since, well, 9/11. Along the way I got to see how even a group of Americans as manifestly deserving of congressional attention as first responders gets ignored in favor of monied interests -- unless such a group can compel Congress' attention. Why should ailing 9/11 responders have to force Congress to act on their behalf? That's a story for a whole book. But I wrote dozens of stories over the years that had noticeable impact on the debate, showing the need

Congress' Toxic Stock Syndrome

Most people would think lawmakers couldn't vote on legislation that benefits them personally, but they can, even after scandals forced Congress to adopt some reforms. To highlight this, I took a look at members of Congress who not only voted on bills that benefitted their personal holdings, but also benefitted interests that most Americans would find distasteful, such as Iran and Russia. It is in this environment that we now see Rep. Chris Collins facing an ethics probe over