The Annenberg forum was packed today as students and professors filed in to watch the Selden ring award ceremony.
Gordon Stables directs the school of journalism and offered them the glass trophy.
Gordon Stables: “We’d now like to present you with the 2023-2024 Selden Ring award for investigative reporting.”
The Dean of the Journalism school, Willow Bay, explained the history of the award.
Dean Bay: “It was established by Selden Ring, a Southern California business leader and philanthropist, to recognize the importance and the value of rigorous investigative journalism to our society and to a vibrant democracy.”
The series of stories that won this year’s award makes you think that in this country, something’s a little fishy. Maybe it’s the picture of US Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito on a luxury fishing vacation with a Republican billionaire. This is one of many examples of what the ProPublica team that won this year’s award call “ethical violations” surrounding the Supreme Court. The reporting team included Justin Elliott, Joshua Kaplan, Brett Murphy, Alex Mierjeski and Kirsten Berg. They worked together to uncover the untold goings on among Supreme Court justices. The team poured over hundreds of documents to understand how, for example, Justice Clarence Thomas accepted numerous gifts and flights from billionaire Harlan Crow.
Joshua Kaplan: “The main thing we found is that a couple justices, particularly Clarence Thomas had been accepting secret luxury gifts from billionaire political donors.”
Joshua Kaplan is one of the reporters.
Kaplan: “Thomas in particular has accepted a stream of gifts that appears to be unprecedented in the modern history of the court.”
Kaplan hopes his teams work will have impact going forward but, he says, accountability would have to change.
Kaplan: “I’d like to think that what these stories have done is brought a lot of attention to something that is quite unique about the Supreme Court, which is unlike any other part of the federal government, the justices face virtually zero oversight and accountability.”
Kaplan has advice for those looking to break into investigative reporting.
Kaplan: “The great pleasure in it and also the key to kind of making it work, is to always have an open mind and to really put in the work to talk to as many people as you possibly can. And it’s so fun because with every story you are working on a topic that is quite new to you. And you’re talking to people who have lived interesting lives and you’re trying your best to understand their world...The other thing is you have to look around widely and try to stay attuned to when something seems off or when something seems like there could be a bigger story there.”
This is journalism with an impact. After the series was published, the Supreme Court adopted an ethics code for the first time in its 234-year history. The US Senate held hearings and many Senators pushed for ethics reform.
The ProPublica reporting team isn’t sure what their next story will be. But in the United States of America, in 2024, there’s no doubt there’s a lot to cover.