The long, destructive path of fire: Talking to Source NM’s Patrick Lohmann about a never-ending wildfire season
In early 2023, Patrick Lohmann, a reporter for the nonprofit Source NM, moved to the small town of Las Vegas, New Mexico, to learn how residents were coping with the aftermath of the largest wildfire in state history. What he learned there was that the destruction brought on by wildfires doesn’t end when the fire itself goes out. It can take years for people to extract benefits from the federal bureaucracy, and for communities to fully recover—if they ever do. Wildfires leave behind debris th...
26 Aug 202422min
1968 all over again? Heather Hendershot and Ted Koppel on a year for the media to remember.
The Democrats are gathering in Chicago next week, and the sitting president has dropped out of the race. But as the guests on today’s podcast remind us, that doesn’t mean history is repeating itself. In 1968, Ted Koppel was just back from a tour covering the war in Vietnam, and assigned to the comparatively tame—if, as he reminds us, not without its moments—presidential campaign of Republican Richard Nixon. Over on the Democratic side, as historian Heather Hendershot writes in her recent book...
15 Aug 202432min
Kamala Harris steps up: Politico’s Eugene Daniels on a wild month of news
Eugene Daniels is a White House reporter for Politico, with a special focus on Kamala Harris. That’s put him front and center for a month of news that few people in politics saw coming. On this episode of The Kicker, Daniels shares what he’s learned from nearly four years of covering the vice president, how her relationship with the press will differ from the president’s, and why you can’t blame the media for Biden’s decision to drop out of the race. Produced by Emily Russell Hosted by Josh...
25 Juli 202431min
Spanish-speaking journalism…in Iowa: A conversation with Lorena Lopez
Lorena Lopez came to the United States from her home country of Nicaragua, where she was an investigative reporter, in 1992. But it wasn’t until 2016 that she managed to return to her passion, as the founding editor of La Prensa, a Spanish-language newspaper serving Western Iowa. On this week’s Kicker, Lopez talks about her long journey back to journalism, why reliable, trusted information available for Spanish-speaking Americans is so hard to come by—and why so many of her readers are leanin...
15 Juli 202430min
What did we know and when? Alex Thompson on investigating Biden’s mental decline
Alex Thompson, a national political correspondent for Axios, first reported that President Biden had started wearing special sneakers, in part to reduce the risk of tripping, last fall. But until the debate last week, he was still one of a small handful of reporters who was aggressively pursuing direct evidence that Biden’s age – regular fodder for political talk shows – was actually having an impact. He joins the Kicker to talk about what it’s like to do that kind of journalism, how the Whit...
3 Juli 202424min
Not even a ‘no comment’: Paul Farhi on the media’s historic struggles with relevance
Paul Farhi was a media reporter for the Washington Post until the end of last year. But instead of retiring, he’s been busier than ever, chronicling the seemingly endless stream of bad news stories about the media business, for outlets like The Atlantic and here at CJR. He joins The Kicker to talk about traditional journalism’s struggles to stay relevant amid the boundless other means companies and high-profile individuals have to communicate with the public—and the growing number of people w...
23 Juni 202434min
Staying “scrupulously neutral”: Steve Herman on covering the White House in the age of Trump
Steve Herman was the White House correspondent for Voice of America during the Trump administration. He joins The Kicker to talk about his new book on what it was like to cover a deeply unpredictable president—and why he believes it’s essential, even under extreme circumstances, for reporters to stay out of the political fray. This podcast is part of “Covering the Election,” CJR’s spring special issue on news and politics in 2024. Read the whole issue here. You can find Herman’s Behind the Wh...
12 Juni 202436min
How Israeli Journalists Cover Their Own Country
Haaretz is one of Israel’s most respected newspapers. It’s also one of the few willing to openly criticize the government for its treatment of Palestinians. The Kicker speaks with Hagar Shezaf and Omer Benjakob, two journalists with the paper, about what it’s like to do accountability journalism in Israel these days—especially in the aftermath of the devastating Hamas attacks of October 7th. Read more: Hagar Shezaf on violence against Palestinians in the West Bank since October 7 And o...
17 Maj 202441min
