Reuters, VICE News, NBC win top awards in National Press Club journalism contest
Reuters won top awards for consumer journalism and foreign coverage, while VICE News won first place for news photo journalism and best young journalist in the National Press Club’s 2020 journalism awards. NBC News won top broadcast awards for consumer journalism and for foreign coverage.
The award winners will be celebrated in a virtual event December 2 at 7 p.m.
National Press Club past president Jonathan Salant of NJ Advance Media won for best Washington Regional Reporting. Cameron Joseph of VICE News won the Sandy Hume Memorial Award for young journalists. Michael Bender of The Wall Street Journal won the Lee Walczak Award for his coverage of Donald Trump’s most effective campaign weapon: his political rallies.
Natasha Daly of National Geographic won the Ann Cottrell Free Animal Reporting Award for “The Hidden Cost of Wildlife Tourism.” And a team from WRC-TV won for its coverage of the State Department’s failure to protect dogs used in its war on terror.
Valerie Insinna of Defense News won the Michael Dornheim Award for her in-depth feature series, “The Hidden Troubles of the F-35.”
Winners
Consumer Journalism-Newspapers: The investigative Reuters series, "Hidden Injustice," sheds light on how the judicial practice of sealing court files and evidence has been manipulated by corporate America to hide public health and safety information, often with deadly results.
Consumer Journalism-Periodicals: “Hidden Harm” by Christina Jewett of Kaiser Health News looked at a secret government database of medical device malfunctions and offered compelling stories of the harm caused by these malfunctions.
Consumer Journalism-Broadcast: An NBC News Investigative Unit used Freedom of Information Act requests to dig out information and reveal for the first time how many fans are injured by foul balls during major league baseball games.
Washington Regional Reporting Award: Jonathan Salant of NJ Advance Media for a variety of political stories that looked at the link between power and campaign money.
Edwin M Hood for Diplomatic Correspondence:
Print: Reuters reporters Christopher Bing and Joel Schectman, for their entry “Project Raven” that used on-the-record interviews with ex-NSA spies and a review of thousands of documents to show how a program to help the United Arab Emirates prevent the next 9/11 attack went off the rails.
Broadcast: NBC News Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel for his report “American Betrayal.” In this hour-long special report, Engel chronicled President Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. forces from northern Syria
Newsletter Journalism: E&E News and reporter Jeremy Jacobs for his September 2019 series: “Bloodbath: Red Ink Pours Over Northwest Dams.”
Joan M. Friedenberg Online Journalism Award: Disaster in the Pacific, by ProPublica. The entry did a good job in presenting stories graphically about naval accidents in the Pacific, including some that involved multiple fatalities.
Sandy Hume Memorial Award for Excellence in Political Journalism: VICE News reporter Cameron Joseph was the winner for stories on a variety of topics that were well reported, well written and creative.
Joseph D. Ryle Award for Excellence in Writing on the Problems of Geriatrics: Rick Tetzeli of Fortune for a fascinating look at a botanist far outside the ranks of conventional researchers as he pursues a cure for Alzheimer's disease.
Angele Gingras Humor Award: Kaarin Vembar of Retail Dive for her clever columns on the retail business.
Ann Cottrell Free Animal Reporting Award – Print: The Hidden Cost of Wildlife Tourism: People who love animals can unknowingly fuel their suffering, by Natasha Daly of National Geographic.
Ann Cottrell Free Animal Reporting Award – Broadcast: “Dying for Diplomacy” - A year-long investigation by WRC-TV revealed that the U.S. Department of State was failing to protect many of the specially trained dogs it deployed in the war on terror.
Michael A. Dornheim Award: Valerie Insinna, Air Warfare Reporter for Defense News, is getting the award for her in-depth feature series, “The Hidden Troubles of the F-35.”
Lee Walczak Award for Political Analysis: Michael Bender of The Wall Street Journal for “Trump’s Re-Election Playbook,” a series of stories about the core of Trump’s 2016 secret weapon: campaign rallies,
Breaking News Award: No winner this year.
News Photo Award: VICE News’ Adam Desiderio’s winning images capture personal stories of the victors and the victims of the Battle of Baghouz, Syria—a last stronghold of an Isis caliphate.
An update with a list of the 'honorable mention' winners will move in Monday's Wire.