What We’ll Be Covering in a Second Trump Administration — ProPublica

Donald Trump’s victory marks a turning point in the American experiment, and there’s a lot to unpack about what that means.

We’ll leave that analysis to others.

Our role as an investigative news organization is different. In the coming months and years, we will be devoting a significant portion of our staff to chronicling the implications of what promises to be a sea change in the federal government’s role in our lives.

This is nothing new for us. Over the past three presidential administrations, we’ve covered the actions of the federal government closely the Navy’s penchant for building expensive ships which are not suitable for swimming due to deficiencies in public health and safety regulations.

I’ve been a reporter and editor for more than four decades, long enough to see the pendulum of public sentiment swing from the presidency of Ronald Reagan to Barack Obama to Trump. At a time of seismic upheaval in our country, I would like to look back to the words of Adolph S. Ochs when he took control of The New York Times in 1896. The paper, he wrote, would “give news impartially, without fear or favor, regardless of party, sect or interest.”

In the 21st century, “no fear or favor” means maintaining a fact- and data-based approach to journalism. Our job is to give readers an independent, verified account of what’s going on, even when the president calls us enemies of the people or bloodsuckers. At ProPublica, our mantra is that we bring receipts for every story we publish.

We are journalists, not resistance leaders.

Some will argue that ProPublica’s reform-driven model of journalism will be undermined if one political party controls both branches of Congress and the White House.

I don’t agree.

Time and time again, we have seen how well-documented stories drive change in states dominated by one side. One example: our series continues Florida’s Poor Treatment of Families of Children Born with Brain Injuries prompted Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Republican-led Legislature to take immediate action. The ProPublica story, which included a recording of a A 6-year-old Salvadoran girl cries for her mother pushed for an immediate end to the first Trump administration’s policy of deterring migrants by separating families.

As we’ve done for every presidential administration since 2008, our reporters will start with the basic questions about a new government policy: Who benefits? Who is suffering? What are the unintended consequences?

We are aware that perhaps we are entering a new era, unprecedented. Trump’s first administration, which included two impeachments, was defined by his penchant for breaking the rules.

There will be far fewer fences during Trump’s second presidency. A Supreme Court ruling declaring presidents presumptively immune from prosecution for official actions and returning Republican control of the Senate and possibly the House mean there will be few, if any, checks on the president’s powers.

Trump famously said he would not be a dictator, “Except for the first day.” In fact, it will take some time before a picture emerges of how he plans to use the broad powers of his office.

The coming months will feel as chaotic as ever during a transition period. Various figures in the president-elect’s orbit will vie for influence and leak the transition team’s documents in hopes of turning them into reality. You will read many stories about proposals for radical change in every government institution. Some will be accepted. Many others will be cast aside, never to be seen again.

Of course, ProPublica reporters will be happy to get any leaks that sources can share about the transition. You can contact our entire team at propublica.org/tips if you have a tip we should investigate. You can also text or call us at 917-512-0201 or send us a message at this number through Signal, a secure messaging app.

Although Trump’s campaign speeches have been less than linear, he has been clear and consistent about his plans in many areas. Some of these, such as health care and taxes, are topics that ProPublica has long covered closely. Others, like his plan to impose much higher tariffs on imported goods, open up entirely new areas for us to investigate.

The campaign promise that will have the biggest immediate impact will be his plan to deport millions of people who entered this country illegally. Carolyn Leavitt, a campaign spokeswoman, told Fox News on Wednesday that Trump would launch “the largest mass deportation operation” in American history on his first day in office.

Previous presidents have increased immigration enforcement, notably Trump during his first term and Obama. But the United States has not attempted mass arrests of migrants since 1954, when border agents rounded up more than 1 million people living in Texas and California and forcibly transported them to Mexico.

We’ve covered immigration and our recent series of stories about its impact on the cities like Del Rio, Texasand Whitewater, Wisconsinreflect our emphasis on in-depth reporting from the ground. If Trump follows through on his promise to round up and deport 15 to 20 million people, we’ll be covering it in ways that go beyond the daily headlines.

Jesse Eisingerone of our senior editors, addressed his staff this morning with some remarks that I think reporters at ProPublica and other sites should take to heart at this point.

“We are facing the biggest challenge of our professional lives,” he told them. “Now we see if we really meant it when we said we would hold the authorities accountable. Will we do this when our subjects have real power on their side and the desire to use it? We can be persecuted. We can be sued. We can be threatened with violence. We can be ignored. Are we just sunny journalists or are we ready?”