Best of the Week — First Winner

​AP Exclusive: Before Trump job, Manafort worked to aid Putin

Around last November’s election, Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, resurfaced as a priority for the AP’s Washington investigative team when it became clear he was a leading focus of the government’s inquiry into whether Trump’s campaign had coordinated with Russians to meddle in the presidential election.

Jeff Horwitz and Chad Day, along with AP colleagues in Washington and elsewhere, dove in and after weeks of reporting, learned that Manafort had worked for a Russian billionaire a decade ago and had proposed to him a plan to greatly benefit President Vladimir Putin’s government, even as U.S.-Russia relations under then-President George W. Bush grew worse.

For their

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Nimble all-formats team dominates Uganda election coverage

used journalistic savvy and resourcefulness to overcome both an internet ban and AP’s competitors to deliver outstanding all-formats coverage of Uganda’s Jan. 14 presidential election.Uganda had gone to great lengths to discourage international observation of the polls. Just getting into the country with all-important live broadcast equipment required driving into the country at a less-policed border point.And Uganda was widely expected to cut its internet on election day. When it did, reporter Muhumza was unfazed, having wisely filed comprehensive advance copy to colleagues outside the country. He updated with key quotes and details sent by text message.Despite the internet cut, the video team of Kasire and Mwihia noticed that international roaming data was still working. They promptly switched all the SIM cards in their LiveU unit, delivering an incredible four-hours of agency-exclusive live video showing polls opening and heightened security. Authorities eventually got wise and cut off roaming data too.Meanwhile, Delay’s decision to rent a vehicle with black-tinted windows also paid off, allowing him to move around the capital to make compelling photos of security forces without drawing unnecessary attention.Ultimately, the team used its local contacts and managed to negotiate their way into the heavily guarded state broadcaster, where they continued to discreetly file developments for days via state TV’s still operational fast internet — an enormous edge over our competitors who had to rely on much slower communications. The final triumph was to patch and broadcast, live and exclusive, a clean feed of President Museveni's national address on his win.https://bit.ly/39FxH3Chttps://bit.ly/2KEm8l0https://bit.ly/396i1Hy

Best of the States

Sourcework pays off with scoop on Julian Castro presidential bid

Getting a source to give AP a major scoop over competitors can take weeks or months of building credibility and trust. Sometimes that payoff takes years – as Austin, Texas, newsman Paul Weber discovered while breaking the news that former Obama Cabinet member Julian Castro was becoming the first Democrat in the 2020 field to launch an exploratory committee for president.

Weber’s relationship with Castro goes back nearly a decade. Weber moved to AP’s San Antonio bureau in 2009, covering the 34-year-old mayor as a national political figure, including regular source meetings and face time with his family.

When Castro returned to Texas after two years as the nation’s housing secretary, Weber ran into him, stumping for other Democrats on the 2018 campaign trail. Months later Weber received a call from the number he had plugged into his phone eight years earlier: It was Castro calling to say he was “likely” to run for president.

The APNewsBreak immediately trended as a top story on social media and put AP hours ahead of major competitors, including The New York Times, which cited AP and quoted from Weber’s exclusive all-formats interview.

For exceptional source development and for negotiating an AP exclusive, Weber wins this week’s Best of the States.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP explores tense intersection of commerce, gangs, politics in Haiti

obtained rare access to members of Haiti’s wealthy elite — and to the violent gangs that threaten them — for a deep look at doing business in this failed state. Using contacts and determination and building trust, they explored how entrepreneurs continue to operate in an environment where more than 100 heavily armed gangs control access to the port, the fuel and the food supply chains. Kidnappings and killings are not uncommon in the impoverished capital, leaderless after the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse.During their reporting, the pair was threatened verbally by people who didn't want to be photographed and with weapons by gangsters who didn't want them there at all. After many attempts, Buenos-Aires based photographer Abd and freelance reporter Arce finally gained access to Barbecue, the leader of a coalition of gangs who presents himself as a populist fighting economic injustices, but who operates as an armed thug instilling fear in the people.The piece was among AP’s top stories in reader engagement and earned kudos from Pulitzer Center funders: “(Abd and Arce) avoided all the easy frameworks ... and did a fantastic job depicting the abject inequity that is at the root of Haiti's social/economic collapse,” wrote Executive Editor Marina Walker. https://aplink.news/wzdhttps://aplink.photos/b47

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP reveals Nazi ID in Germany, rocks Chile’s presidential race

joined forces across two continents to expose a document that provided undeniable proof that the father of Chile’s presidential frontrunner was a card-carrying Nazi, contradicting the candidate’s vehement denials that his German-born father ever belonged to Adolf Hitler’s movement.A Chilean journalist had previously posted a copy of the elder Kast's Nazi ID card on social media, but the reporting by AP Latin America correspondent Goodman and Berlin correspondent Jordans amplified the story, confirming details, adding context and settling the issue once and for all.The 1941 Nazi party membership card revealed by AP shattered Kast’s insistence that his father, Michael Kast, was not a Nazi but was forcibly recruited by the German army. Their finding was complemented by German historians who explained that Nazi party membership was always a choice, one reserved for the vanguard in society. Additional research revealed that Michael Kast, once in Chile, actively collaborated with the Gen. Augusto Pinochet, the country’s longtime dictator.The story dominated social media in Chile, and Kast’s political opponents, who have tried to frame the election as a fight between freedom and fascism, seized on the news. A photo of the Nazi ID card that Jordans obtained was used widely and major global news outlets did their own stories, crediting AP extensively. https://aplink.news/goc

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

AP reveals politics of immigration policy shifts

for two stories on how the Trump administration is dealing with the surge of migrant families at the border and a claimed lack of detention space. Merchant spotted a solicitation for contractors to build tents near the U.S.-Mexico border to temporarily detain immigrant families, and he followed up with an accountability story revealing that thousands of beds for detained families are empty at a time when President Trump was calling the country “full,” and threatening to send migrants to sanctuary cities as political retribution.https://bit.ly/2GuBJxmhttps://bit.ly/2L4OQuG

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Putting people before politics in Brexit trade coverage

delivered a unique story on the people directly affected by the high-stakes trade talks reaching a crescendo in Brussels. While competitive news organizations focused on the post-Brexit political wrangling, AP took an exclusive look at struggling French fishing crews and overwhelmed British truck drivers stuck in traffic jams at the English Channel. Thanks to years of source building in the region, the journalists were able to identify subjects that provided strong visuals, capturing the attention of AP clients and the public.https://bit.ly/382rj5Ghttps://bit.ly/3gQud1Fhttps://bit.ly/387pGnn

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Persistence wins interview with Marine Le Pen, French presidential candidate

for getting an interview with Marine Le Pen, the French presidential candidate, hours before candidates had to stop making public statements. http://abcn.ws/2pAvdLQ

Best of the States

Jobs boom favors Democratic counties over Trump strongholds; social issues motivate GOP base

President Donald Trump has long asserted that his tax cuts and other policies would accelerate job growth, which, in turn, would serve the “forgotten” men and women who had helped propel him to the White House in the 2016 election.

Washington, D.C.-based economics reporter Josh Boak wondered: Had that actually occurred so far? And how much was job growth a motivating force for Trump supporters?

Boak hit on a possible way to hold the president’s claims to a fair test. He turned to a relatively obscure report issued by the government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, then merged those economic figures with the AP’s 2016 election returns, broken down by county.

The result, under multiple calculations, was clear: The bulk of U.S. hiring under Trump had so far occurred in Democratic counties.

Boak then spent three days in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, an area that had voted decisively for Trump and had lost jobs in the past 12 months. He reported that Republican voters appeared to be motivated more by social issues – opposition to gun control, for example. “Our No. 1 motivating factor,” the county Republican chairman told Boak, “is Second Amendment issues.”

For exclusively documenting how job growth under Trump has disproportionately underserved his geographic base and for illustrating that trend in a community that reflects it, Boak earns this week’s Best of the States award.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Historic presidential race call followed months of prep, hours of analysis

When Election Day arrived, just about everyone in politics had assumed for weeks that Hillary Clinton would soon be the next president. All it would take was California's trove of 55 electoral votes and a series of easy wins elsewhere to push her past the 270 she would need.

Not David Pace, Stephen Ohlemacher and AP's team of race callers and decision analysts.

They had prepared for months for all contingencies _ including a race that wasn't a blowout but a collection of close races that would demand deep analysis of AP's vote count, exit polls and the history of voting patterns state by state. To call the race for president before all others, and to do so with the unfailing accuracy the world expects from the AP on Election Day, would require excellence at calling those tight races that go deep into the night.

They did just that. And their call of the assumption-shattering result earns the Beat of the Week.

Beat of the Week

(Honorable Mention)

Former presidential candidate Gary Johnson running for US Senate

for reporting the news that former presidential candidate Gary Johnson is running for the U.S. Senate even before his campaign announcement. https://bit.ly/2MtXgMs

Best of the Week — First Winner

Immigration: Back-to-back scoops by investigative teams, Washington reporters

The disturbing stories of more than 2,000 kids caught up in the U.S. immigration system – including babies and toddlers forcibly separated from their parents – dominated headlines and led newscasts around the world.

AP reporters, working across the country, in Washington, D.C., Latin America and along the U.S.-Mexican border led the coverage of the impact of the zero tolerance immigration policy. Their work produced a series of scoops that set the agenda, alerting Capitol Hill leaders to a major White House order, leaving an MSNBC anchor in tears and generating action by politicians.

For their work, the Beat of the Week is shared by investigative reporters Garance Burke, Martha Mendoza, Michael Biesecker and Jake Pearson, and Washington reporters Jill Colvin and Colleen Long. The award also recognizes an outstanding company-wide effort that included reporting from numerous locations and across formats, putting the AP repeatedly in front of a major global story.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Nothing routine about it: Larger-than-life photo of Putin dominates play

It's hard to pull off a truly distinctive photo at a set-piece event with the world's press also gathered there. Russia's Chief Photographer Alexander (Sasha) Zemlianichenko, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, did just this with a low angle on the big screen of Putin's face, staring down and dominating the audience at Putin's state-of-the nation address March 1. The photo, which graced front pages and websites around the world, wins the Beat of the Week.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Divided America: Seeing options shrinking, white men ask why

As the bitter election season winds down, a recurring theme has been the conviction among many white men that they have been losing ground in society. National writer Matt Sedensky wanted to find a way to tell their story for a concluding installment in the series Divided America.

The yearlong assessment of America’s national disunity comprised more than two dozen deeply reported, multi-format stories exploring splits along racial, religious and socio-economic lines, as well as clashing attitudes on issues ranging from gun regulation to immigration.

Sedensky focused on the views of white men turning toward Republican nominee Donald Trump and rejecting Democrat Hillary Clinton. He listened to the voices on a call-in radio show in Texas _ both host and callers revealing their angst _ and then, through backgrounding interviews with them and reporting on research, showed why these men feel as they do.

Best of the Week — First Winner

AP first to identify, interview Russian-American lobbyist at Trump Jr. meeting

The sensational news about a campaign-season meeting involving a Russian lawyer and Donald Trump’s inner circle – including his son, Donald Trump Jr. – developed over six days, with details and accounts changing almost by the hour. Reports trickled out that another man also was at the meeting to represent Russian interests.

With all major news organizations in hot pursuit, Washington’s Desmond Butler was the first to nail the identity of the lobbyist in question and also to nab the first on-the-record interview with him. For tenacious source work, Butler wins Beat of the Week.

Best of the States

AP team finds diversity of politics and religion among West Virginia evangelicals

A tweet was the seed for this illuminating story. “Most people in my rural, Appalachian hometown are being radicalized at church by their pastor, which is the person they trust the most,” it read. AP’s Global Religion team ran with it.

Reporter Luis Andres Henao and visual journalist Jessie Wardarski visited the parishioners of three churches in Bluefield, West Virginia, including one pastor who had attended the Jan. 6 Washington rally that degenerated into a riot. The AP pair spent weeks convincing him to sit down for an interview. The result was an all-formats package of diverse congregations seeking common ground, even as they are divided on the role of evangelical Christianity in American politics. 

For applying gentle persuasion and balanced reporting to produce a nuanced look at religion and politics in one West Virginia town, Henao and Wardarski win this week’s Best of the States award. 

Best of the Week — First Winner

AP analysis: How gerrymandering benefited GOP in 2016

How is it that Republicans and Democrats can split the vote about equally in races for Congress and state legislatures, yet the GOP wins significant majorities in the House of Representatives and in statehouses across the country? Partisan gerrymandering, which manipulates legislative districts for one party’s benefit, has been suspected, but there has been no way to actually quantify it – until now.

An Associated Press team of David Lieb, Meghan Hoyer and Maureen Linke, applying a new statistical method that calculates partisan advantage, analyzed U.S. House and state legislative races across the country last year and found that redistricting controlled by Republicans had given their party a distinct advantage and one that will be hard for Democrats to overcome in upcoming election cycles.

Their multi-format report – including easy-to-grasp interactives and a trove of localized data – is the Beat of the Week.

Best of the Week — First Winner

AP launches ‘Looking for America’ series with an immersive trip into Appalachia

Assignments don’t come much more challenging or ambitious: Take a road trip across the nation to see how Americans in different regions and are facing the confluence of COVID-19, economic meltdown, racial protests and a tumultuous presidential election. The first installment of the project had to both launch the series and hold its own as a story, and this AP all-formats team came through beautifully.

The story focuses on Ohio communities in the much-maligned Appalachian region, thoughtfully acknowledging both the truths and the enduring stereotypes so often associated with it. The resulting package resonated for days with readers.

For compelling journalism that speaks to core issues affecting Americans in a turbulent year, the team of enterprise reporter Tim Sullivan, enterprise photographer Maye-E Wong and video journalist Noreen Nasir earns AP’s Best of the Week honors.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Trust in AP: Unmatched sourcing delivers scoop on fears of National Guard insider attack

On the news-heavy weekend between impeachment and inauguration, Lolita Baldor broke a story that became the dominant item for news organizations across platforms: Top military officials feared insider attacks from National Guardsmen activated to protect the inauguration, prompting the FBI to vet all 25,000 troops sent to the city.

And officials weren’t whispering their concerns anonymously; Baldor quoted the Secretary of the Army, Ryan McCarthy. That was no fluke; Baldor has built trust with McCarthy and other top officials at the Pentagon. The Army granted her exclusive, off-the-record access to an inaugural planning session, then arranged on-the-record interviews with a number of leaders.

Baldor’s scoop immediately lit up social media and was picked up by some 330 news outlets, including networks and major publications.

For impressive source work that produced a major scoop in the intensive buildup to the inauguration, Baldor wins AP’s Best of the Week award.

Best of the Week — First Winner

Multiformat exclusive: Thousands of child and adolescent brides enter US – legally

You know your scoop has touched a nerve when it gets tweeted by both Ann Coulter and Chelsea Clinton.

Such was the case with Colleen Long’s multiplatform APNewsBreak that the U.S. approved thousands of requests by men to have their child or adolescent brides admitted to the United States. The story not only pointed to problems in immigration law, but also lax state laws that make immigration by child brides possible.

The story started with a tip from Ron Nixon, AP’s new international investigations editor, who had been told by a source that data requested by the Senate Homeland Security Committee would be startling.

Nixon passed the information to Long, the Washington-based homeland security reporter, who persuaded committee staff to give her the story exclusively. She also went beyond the striking data to give readers a sense of how the issue affects women’s lives, speaking with women who had been married as children. A compelling video accompanied the piece.

On a busy news day, the story was one of AP’s most widely used, fronting many news websites and posted to Facebook by multiple news organizations. The video piece also had a strong showing, receiving thousands of YouTube streams and 27 customer downloads.

For revealing a little-known loophole in immigration policy that raises concerns over security and exploitation, and for connecting the data to women victimized by the policy, Colleen Long wins this week’s Best of the AP.