The pandemic has canceled lots of journalism internships, classes & conferences, leaving a hole in crucial mentoring. So I’m making time each week to talk to students & young journalists about reporting, writing, stories & career development. Sign up here:
Something I learned today: At the Mount Sinai hospital in South Nassau, Long Island, every time a COVID-19 patient recovers enough to leave, they play “Here Comes the Sun” over the PA system.
Across all Mount Sinai hospitals, more than 1,100 patients have been discharged so far.
The New York Times worked with a doctor to film 72 hours at Elmhurst, the hospital that's been hardest hit by the coronavirus outbreak in NY. The result is an extraordinary piece of video journalism
Everybody should watch this: (by
@robinnyc7
/
@rarecanary
)
In the richest city in the richest country in the world, this is how nurses are already being forced to protect themselves from coronavirus -- with garbage bags
#CoronavirusNewYork
Another sliver of good news, because we could all use it:
Yesterday,
@MountSinaiNYC
asked people who have recovered from
#coronavirus
to donate plasma to see if it could help current patients
Today, they told staff that in the first hour after they asked, 500 people volunteered
Whoa. New York state has been dramatically undercounting Covid-19 deaths in nursing homes, according to an investigation by the attorney general. The actual number of deaths may be 50% higher than Gov. Andrew Cuomo has told the public: (by
@jessemckinley
)
Whoa: Half of the coronavirus tests processed last night in New York came back positive. (About 9,000 positives out of 18,000 tests). That is ... a high percentage. The state is now at 75,795 cases.
#CoronavirusNewYork
New:
@AOC
is joining the push for a government bailout of New York City taxi drivers trapped in exploitative medallion loans. She's the most prominent politician so far to call for a bailout:
NEW: The Hasidic Jewish community runs scores of private boys’ schools that have gotten over $1 billion in public money. But a NYT investigation found they are denying students a basic education, trapping generations of kids in poverty. With
@ElizaShapiro
:
Last week, Dr. Colleen Smith risked her job to show the world what was happening at NY's Elmhurst Hospital.
Now, she herself has tested positive for
#coronavirus
. So far her symptoms are mild.
If you missed her powerful video with the NYT, here it is:
NEW: Over the past year, a spate of suicides has revealed a financial crisis in New York's cab industry. Officials have blamed Uber, but much of the crisis can be traced to a handful of taxi tycoons. Here’s the real story, based on 10 months of reporting:
Gov. Cuomo has released an 85-page written response to the independent investigation, but it's only 26 pages of text. Most of the rest is dozens of photos of him hugging people and other politicians hugging people:
33 days ago,
@PhillyDotCom
reported that students at the prestigious Glen Mills Schools were routinely beaten.
Today, the state removed all students from the school.
Support local journalism.
BREAKING: The state has ordered the emergency removal of all boys remaining at Glen Mills Schools. The state found "gross incompetence, negligence...and abuse likely to constitute immediate and serious danger to the life or health of the children in care.” Story TK
@phillydotcom
NEW: New York's largest hospital chain, Northwell Health, has abruptly announced it will stop suing patients over unpaid medical bills amid the pandemic, and it will rescind all of the lawsuits that it filed in 2020 -- hours after we reported on the suits
We spent over a year reporting about Hasidic schools. We want people in the Hasidic community to be able to read the story. So we translated it into a Hasidic dialect of Yiddish. It may be the first time the NYT has ever published an article in Yiddish:
Dr. Lorna M. Breen, a leader in one of NY's largest hospitals, has died by suicide.
"Make sure she’s praised as a hero, because she was," her father said. "She’s a casualty just as much as anyone else who has died."
(by
@AliWatkins
+ our
@NYTMetro
team)
Overheard in the New York Times newsroom: "Okay, well, I'll just keep reporting what's happening, and you can keep trying to tell me it's not happening"
NEW: Mayor Bill de Blasio is closing all the nightclubs, movie theaters and concert venues in New York City. Restaurants and bars will be limited to food take-out and delivery only. He just announced he'll sign executive order to make the changes, which will take effect Tuesday.
I moved to Texas in the middle of the 2014 governor's race, when Wendy Davis raised tens of millions of dollars and got national attention. Democrats thought she'd win. She got crushed, 60% to 40%
Beto O'Rourke lost, but the margin -- 50.9% to 48.3% -- is truly shocking
NEW: Andrew Yang is leading the race to be NYC’s next mayor, in part because many see him as a successful entrepreneur. But a NYT review has found that in the biggest leadership stint of his life, he made big promises & failed to deliver. With
@KatieGlueck
As of today, The New York Times has dropped its paywall for coverage of the 2020 election. Read all of the live updates here, even if you don't have a subscription. (Although you should get a subscription)
Just in: A tiger at the Bronx Zoo has tested positive for coronavirus, and several other animals are also showing symptoms. "Public health officials believe these large cats became sick after being exposed to a zoo employee who was actively shedding virus"
NEW: A high-level New York City government panel is planning to propose a bailout of up to $500 million for city cabdrivers trapped in exploitative loans, a major step in the effort to help drivers in response to a New York Times investigation on the loans
In 2017, I filed a public records request with the
@MTA
, seeking a copy of their org chart
Today, 5 years later, they finally responded -- to tell me that they, a $17 billion agency, don't have org charts
Instead, they sent a link to their website:
Three years ago, NYC officials announced they had looked at a group of Hasidic schools and found most weren’t providing an adequate education. Then the city shelved the investigation amid the pandemic. We picked up where it left off. Here’s what we found:
I know time doesn't mean anything anymore, but some moments still deserve to be noted: As of today, I have been a New York Times reporter for three years 👨🏻💻
NEW: The agency that oversees elections in NYC is staffed almost entirely by relatives & friends of political leaders, even the computer programmers. Many are incompetent. “The agency is chronically dysfunctional,” one current staffer said. With
@MRothfeld
Wow. In a random test of New York City residents conducted this week, 21.2% tested POSITIVE for coronavirus antibodies,
@NYGovCuomo
just announced
The positive test rate statewide was 13.6%
Anybody who follows me knows I fight with the
@MTA
's public records office. They take years to respond to even small requests & they invent nonsensical rationales for denying requests / pushing me to the PR office (which never comments)
But this week, we may have reached a truce
NEW: NY's shortage of ventilators is worse than you think. If
#coronavirus
reaches Spanish Flu levels, up to 15,000 New Yorkers a week may be unable to get needed breathing machines -- and the state may have no way to quickly get more (with
@JoeKGoldstein
)
On some days in April, more than 70% of coronavirus tests processed in New York City came back positive.
Yesterday,
@NYCMayor
Bill de Blasio just announced, the positivity rate was 0.24%.
Truly a stunning change (and not driven just by increased testing)
NY’s all-male Hasidic schools serve 50,000 boys, about as many students as in Boston Public Schools. They get more public money than other private schools in NY. But they appear to be operating in violation of laws guaranteeing kids an adequate education:
BREAKING: The largest Hasidic Jewish school in New York State, the Central United Talmudical Academy, admitted in federal court today that it stole millions of dollars from a variety of government programs as part of a yearslong fraud: (with
@elizashapiro
)
For the first time ever, New York's top law enforcement official will soon be a woman. And, also for the first time ever, it will soon be an African American (by
@JeffCMays
)
Before entering politics, Andrew Yang made a name for himself by establishing a nonprofit called Venture for America. He said it would create 100,000 jobs in struggling U.S. cities. After an extensive review, we only found 150 jobs created in those cities:
Next time you get in a NYC taxi, think about this graphic
If your driver owns the cab, they can make $10,000 in revenue a month
They likely get to take home less than $1,500 of that
And for that privilege, they probably owe their bank at least $500,000
In today's
@NYTimes
: The story of how a handful of New York businessmen used Chicago taxi permits to make hundreds of millions of dollars — and helped ruin hundreds of immigrant drivers. The tale winds from Moscow to the Hamptons to Rogers Park. Read it:
The AG is probing the lending practices.
The mayor is investigating the brokers.
The speaker is drafting legislation.
The Legislature is planning a hearing.
The comptroller is calling for a lender summit.
The latest on the fallout from our taxi series:
Just in:
@AOC
and 10 other members of Congress have sent a letter to the Fed, FDIC, NCUA & OCC expressing "strong concerns" in the aftermath of our series on taxi medallion lending. They're asking each agency to say what they're doing to address issues by 8/30
Here's the letter:
The Seattle Times is an American treasure. No other newspaper could do a better job covering a crisis like
#coronavirus
. Read
@RachelAbramsNY
on how reporters are working around the clock to cover the biggest story in years:
BREAKING: The New York Attorney General is suing New York City for $810 million for its role in allegedly artificially inflating taxi medallion prices. Any money recovered could go to medallion owners. This is a result of the inquiry launched in response to our NYT investigation
Hasidic boys are suffering from levels of educational deprivation not seen anywhere else in New York state. Of those who take standardized tests in reading and math, more than 99% of them fail, according to scores from the last year with full data:
NEW: In the pandemic, almost all major NY hospitals stopped suing patients over unpaid medical bills. But the state’s largest hospital chain, Northwell Health, run by a close ally of Gov. Cuomo, has sued thousands of patients over bills as small as $700
NEW: At the height of the pandemic, New York spent more than $52 million to transform a tennis center into a medical facility. It was desperately needed. But in the end, it only treated 79 patients. The inside story of the Billie Jean King field hospital:
Yesterday, I got a chance to speak to 2,500 inspiring colleagues about something truly important: the power of local investigative journalism, and why it is needed now more than ever
(I also got to thank approximately a billion people)
Here's what I said
NEW: In interviews, more than 35 people who have worked in Gov. Andrew Cuomo's executive chamber over the past decade described it to The New York Times as deeply chaotic, unprofessional and toxic, especially for young women. Our story, with
@LuisFerre
:
If you're wondering why we can't just build more ventilators - They must be staffed 24/7 by trained staff & we don't have them
"If the pandemic got so bad that we were using all the ventilators, we likely wouldn’t have enough staff to operate them anyway"
For those dismissing this by claiming that Ted Cruz is uniquely unpopular, a reminder: He finished 2nd in the 2016 GOP presidential primary. He's a skilled politician
The fact that Beto came close to beating him, in TEXAS, is a notable result that I think is getting missed a bit
For years, thousands of New York City taxi drivers were channeled into exploitative loans that enriched bankers, brokers and city officials but left them in deep debt and financial ruin. Today, the city finally agreed to rescue them. Our story:
NEW: In scathing letter, fired NYC investigations chief claims that Mayor Bill de Blasio repeatedly pressured him not to release reports that exposed failures in responding to child abuse allegations & lead at city housing and problems at NYPD & the Department of Corrections
Hasidic leaders created the schools to provide religious instruction — and wall off their students from the secular world. For up to eight hours a day, they drill boys in Jewish law, regularly enforcing order through corporal punishment, the NYT found:
From 2002 to 2014, the price of the permit that lets a driver own a cab (a “medallion”) rose from $200K to $1M
It wasn’t by accident
Some of NY's biggest taxi leaders artificially inflated the price, and made millions by issuing reckless loans to buyers
At one of the nation's largest nursing homes, conditions are so dire that many nurses have stopped coming to work. A top medical director hasn't ventured inside in weeks. 70 have died so far. Our story on a facility that was troubled long before the virus
While taxi industry leaders got rich, their methods stripped immigrant families of life savings, crushed drivers under massive debt and created a bubble that eventually burst
950 cabbies have filed for bankruptcy. Thousands more are struggling to survive
It is unacceptable for
@IRE_NICAR
to have an all-White executive committee. After reflecting on how we got here, and discussing how to fix it, I and the rest of the committee have decided a new election must be held -- with new rules and longterm reforms:
An estimated 61 million Americans live with a disability, so this is important & needed: The New York Times is hiring a young journalist to cover people with disabilities.
As part of the program, I will mentor this journalist. I can't wait.
Details here:
On 1/17/18, Andy Byford's 2nd day on the job, I requested all the emails he sent or received on his 1st day
Two years later, the
@MTA
has not yet even acknowledged the request. And now Byford has quit
So it goes in Cuomo's New York, the least transparent state I've ever worked
Just in: For the first time, a New Yorker with
#coronavirus
has died. The patient was an 82-year-old woman with an underlying medical condition (emphysema), Gov. Andrew Cuomo just announced to reporters
NEW: Coronavirus has ravaged NY’s poor neighborhoods. But nevertheless, their hospitals have gotten the least resources to fight back. Mortality rates suggest patients may be dying as a result. NYT investigation with
@JoeKGoldstein
,
@sharonNYT
&
@sherifink
NEW: This week, The
@NYTimes
exposed a financial bubble in the taxi medallion industry. But that's not where we had expected our reporting would lead. Here's the story behind the story:
In New York, where homelessness is at an all-time high, one of the city's most powerful shelter providers has preyed on his own homeless clients for years — and officials have known about it, but have done nothing. A stunning investigation by
@AmyJHarris
:
I’m honored to have been elected to the board of
@IRE_NICAR
, an important and inspiring group of investigative journalists. I can’t wait to get to work.
#IRE19
Just in: For the first time since the pandemic began, there are fewer coronavirus patients in ICUs in New York state today than yesterday, Gov. Cuomo just announced
Four hours later, the Cuomo administration still has not commented on this report. It's a rare silence for an extremely aggressive communications operation. Updated story, from
@JesseMcKinley
and
@LuisFerre
:
Whoa. New York state has been dramatically undercounting Covid-19 deaths in nursing homes, according to an investigation by the attorney general. The actual number of deaths may be 50% higher than Gov. Andrew Cuomo has told the public: (by
@jessemckinley
)
NEW: Federal prosecutors have opened an investigation into the New York City taxi industry. They're examining thousands of exploitative loans that industry leaders gave to immigrant cabdrivers: (with
@WRashbaum
)
Full story: New York City arrests notorious taxi industry debt collector profiled in Times investigation: "The city will not tolerate these kinds of illegal and callous actions against medallion owners"
@USGAO
Here's a key part of the report.
Congress ordered a study of why the US wastes billions by spending 5x as much per mile of subway track as every other country in the world.
The
@USGAO
interviewed track builders who told them that cost comparisons are hard. So they didn't do it.
As for Uber: It may have hastened the bursting of the taxi bubble, but it didn't cause it
The average revenue per cab is only down by ~10% since Uber arrived
(Cabs have been protected because 97% of rides start in Manhattan or airports; most Uber rides begin in outer boroughs)
Former Daily editor in chief
@brianmrosenthal
won a
#PulitzerPrize
in Investigative Reporting Monday for a two-part investigation into predatory loans in New York City’s taxi industry for the
@nytimes
America's largest newspaper chain is effectively slashing reporter pay by 25%. The Tampa Bay Times is cutting its print edition to 2x/week. A group of suburban Chicago papers is closing.
Coronavirus is devastating local journalism.
SUBSCRIBE TO YOUR LOCAL NEWSPAPER. Today. Now.
NEW: New York City pays private companies $350 million a year to provide special education in Orthodox Jewish schools. But in the Hasidic community, money is going for services that are sometimes not needed, or even provided, a NYT investigation has found:
Something every New Yorker should know: there are 114,659 homeless students in our city. NY's biggest homeless student crisis on record is getting worse.
For this story, the great
@AlexLemonides
& I spent months analyzing data to determine how much these private schools get in public funding each year. We identified $375 million in just the last year before the pandemic, a sum that has never been reported:
Big news: The NYT is making a Texas-sized investment in covering the nation's fastest-growing state:
-
@JDavidGoodman
in Houston
-
@EDJSandoval
in San Antonio
-
@PublicRoad
in Dallas, covering religion
-And
@JamieStockwell
overseeing it all
A dream team
NEW: New York taxi industry leaders made millions by creating a bubble in the NY medallion market. But they didn’t stop there. They took their reckless business model to Boston, Philadelphia, Miami and most of all, Chicago. The latest in our investigation:
To report our series on the taxi industry, the
@NYTimes
interviewed 450 people, reviewed thousands of documents and built a database of every medallion sale since 1995. But most importantly, we listened to lots and lots of cabbies like Mohammed Hoque
Our review also found problems around diversity & inclusion at Andrew Yang’s nonprofit. Its application process disadvantaged HBCU graduates; over 80% of its recruits were white; and it kept working with a company after an exec used anti-Black racial slurs
It’s been an honor to spend the last 6.5 years on
@NYTMetro
, diving deeply into some of the biggest issues facing New York. Now I’m excited for a new challenge: investigating stories around the country. Send me ideas!
Wow. The first study of TX's special ed cap is out, and it's startling
@UCDavis
/
@Cornell
researchers found the cap made kids with mild disabilities much less likely to get sped- and that reduced their likelihood of going to college by 37 PERCENTAGE POINTS
I'm proud to be part of the
@NYTimes
's foray into national television.
The Weekly debuts June 2 on FX (and June 3 on Hulu). You're not going to want to miss it.
We’ve been hard at work over the past year to bring journalism from The New York Times to television, and we’re excited to share a sneak peek. Take a look at how The Weekly is coming together.
It’s official: New York State has banned corporal punishment in private schools, months after we reported about the practice in religious schools in the Hasidic community. It’s now one of just a handful of states in the US with bans. With
@ElizaShapiro
:
4,000 people bought medallions at inflated prices. Many were low-income drivers who had to sign huge loans with one-sided terms
Some signed interest-only loans that made them pay hefty fees, forfeit rights and give up most of their income -- indefinitely
NEW: He was a New York celebrity with $525M, Ferraris & villas in the French Riviera. But he got it by helping create a bubble that ruined thousands of immigrant cabbies. The story of the Taxi King and how he embodies the rise & fall of an iconic industry:
Full story: New York City taxi titans Alan Kaufman and Tony Georgiton attested and charged with scheme to enrich themselves, partially at expense of their immigrant cabby clients:
I love this note at the bottom of the (incredible) investigation published today by
@CoreyGJohnson
,
@RWoolington
and
@Eli_Mur
. All news organizations should do this. Journalism costs money. We need to do a better job of making that clear to the public
The NYT has selected
@AmandaMoMorris
to be its first reporting fellow focused on disability issues. This is an important effort, and I'm so excited to be involved. Welcome!
NEW: In wake of Times investigation, the New York City Council is introducing a package of legislation to boost regulation of the taxi medallion market to prevent reckless lending. Among the provisions: a ban on Confessions of Judgment in medallion loans:
JUST IN: New York City is creating a $65 million fund to help taxi drivers who were buried in debt after buying medallion permits. This is a major victory for drivers after years of financial devastation. Story to come
How my reporting is going today: “You keep calling me when I’m in the middle of either gambling or golfing. Right now it’s golfing. Call back later. Bye.”
#journalism
More than 2,800 journalists from all 50 states and 30 other countries are tuning in to
@IRE_NICAR
's annual conference this year -- a record. The conference is starting now.
Journalism is alive and well.
#IRE20
#IRE2020
For 18 months, I've been investigating the taxi industry in New York City and across the United States. I've met hundreds of cabdrivers. Over all that time, one story has stuck with me. I got to tell it in today's
@NYTimes
: