Non-Academic Writing
Prior to starting graduate school at Harvard University, I spent five years at POLITICO, a Washington D.C.-based digital media company. I began my tenure at POLITICO in the sales department before accepting a position as a copy editor in the editorial department -- a rare move given the strict firewall between business and editorial -- which has afforded me a unique window into American media.
During my tenure in the newsroom, I contributed to and guest-wrote POLITICO's Influence newsletter, covering lobbying and money in politics; contributed to POLITICO Pro, POLITICO's policy news subscription service, on the energy and environment beat; "woke up" the newsroom at 4:15 a.m. each day as the editor responsible for overseeing publication of most of POLITICO's morning newsletters and copy editing breaking news content in the early morning; and ultimately served as a senior web editor, overseeing a small team of copy editors and digital producers.
My opinion writing on policy and politics has appeared in The Oregonian, the New Jersey Star-Ledger, the Press of Atlantic City (New Jersey), and the Cornell Daily Sun. I have also been interviewed in several outlets, including NJ 101.5, WNAV 1430 Annapolis, and CBS 13 Baltimore.
Selected Works
I interviewed half a dozen legal scholars to investigate if bipartisan calls to ban former lawmakers from lobbying were constitutional. While "not obviously unconstitutional," scholars largely felt that the Supreme Court’s libertarian leanings on the First Amendment under Chief Justice John Roberts made the success of a constitutional challenge likely.
Speaking of former lawmakers lobbying, my colleague Theodoric Meyer and I scooped the competition when we reported that a prominent pair of former congressmen were heading to K Street. Democratic Caucus Chairman Joe Crowley, who had recently been ousted by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Republican Bill Shuster, former chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, joined the lobbying powerhouse Squire Patton Boggs just weeks after leaving Congress.
President Trump's escalation of trade tensions with China through the liberal use of tariffs led to a spree of small and medium-sized manufacturers with no prior D.C. presence hiring lobbying firms to aid them in their requests for exemptions. I examined more than 10,000 tariff exemption requests from the Office of the United States Trade Representative to investigate how effective lobbying was for these firms. (Note: Some causal inference training would have been helpful at the time.)
Early on in the COVID-19 pandemic, the newsroom increased coverage hours and tapped journalists from all beats to contribute to our coverage of the ongoing health crisis. I pitched in by reporting on tensions between governors and the White House over handling of the pandemic; Trump's threats to withdraw funding from the World Health Organization over its relationship with China; mayors spotlighting racial health disparities exacerbated by the pandemic; and states' deliberations over reopening schools.