Wendi C. Thomas

Image of pearls, ivy and pink and green sparkles with a big pink January 15 in the middle.

🩷💚🩷💚Happy Founders’ Day to all my sorors of Alpha Kappa Alpha Inc., especially the sorors of Kappa chapter! 🩷💚🩷💚

Our Reporters Reached Out for Comment. They Were Accused of Stalking and Intimidation. Our journalists reach out to people they’re writing about to ensure fairness. But in this environment, they’ve found their efforts to do so are more likely to be vilified than appreciated.

“You are not entitled to a response from us, or anyone, ever,” is what a US Education Department spokesperson wrote to one of our reporters, @megomatz.bsky.social, after she repeatedly tried to get comment from the department and its officials. My column on the condemnation of good journalism.

After Trump Officials Cut Food Aid to Kenya, Children Starved to Death “Brutal and traumatizing”: Interviews and a trove of internal documents show government officials and aid workers desperately tried to warn Trump advisers about impending disaster and death.

A story that should shock our collective conscience: After Trump Cuts to Kenya Food Aid, Children Died of Starvation

Some Memphis businesses suffer amid federal Task Force presence • Tennessee Lookout MEMPHIS — Saturday lunch is usually peak busy at La Guadalupana restaurant, one of the city’s oldest sit-down Mexican taquerias along a busy commercial strip in the city’s diverse Berclair neighborhoo...

"I work on Beale Street and it is dead,” said Joe Calhoun, who operates the Withers Collection Museum, a designated landmark on the U.S. Civil Rights Trail. @anitawadhwani.bsky.social reports on the economic fallout in Memphis from the presence of a law enforcement task force.

Trump’s Own Mortgages Match His Description of Mortgage Fraud, Records Reveal The Trump administration has argued that Fed board member Lisa Cook may have committed mortgage fraud by declaring more than one primary residence on her loans. We found Trump once did the very thing ...

Trump hung up on a ProPublica reporter after being asked whether his Florida mortgages were similar to those of others he had accused of fraud. 🤔

MLK50 Year-End Fundraising Campaign We're raising $50,000 to fuel community-centered, accountability reporting in Memphis.

It’s Giving Tuesday! Will you consider making a gift to @mlk50.com? All donations matched today up to $4,250. givebutter.com/rootedinmemp...

Ooh, @gingerthompson.bsky.social has something coming?

I CANNOT WAIT.

Care about our unhoused brothers and sisters? You’ll want to read this.

No Kings demonstration sign of photos of Trump administration officials in a grid with the words “The Shady Bunch” in the middle.

Woman dressed in a red “Handmaid’s Tale” dress carrying a black sign with red letters that reads: Don’t let the bastards grind you down.

Sign at Memphis No Kings demonstration of a Nobel Peace Prize medallion with Trump’s face and the words “Nobel Putz Prize.”

No Kings Memphis demonstration sign of a red couch with these words above: Couches against JD Vance.

Signs from the No Kings demonstration in Memphis. I’ve seen a crowd estimate of 7,000.

Bill Lee said people arrested by task force are “violent criminals and known gang members.” Data show that’s not true. Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee speaks during a Tuesday morning press conference with Memphis Mayor Paul Young at the temporary command center for the Memphis Safe Task Force. Photo by Andrea Morales / MLK…

MLK50: Justice Through Journalism obtained a report on one day’s worth of activities of the ‘Memphis Safe Task Force.’ It contradicts claims made by the governor about how the task force is focused on violent criminals. mlk50.co/4qkfz6b

The @chicago.suntimes.com photographer who risked their personal health and safety to take this photograph is Anthony Vazquez. Please credit photographers and media outlets. In this age of misinformation, a photo with no context could be anything at all.

FACT FOCUS: Democrats did not shut down the government to give health care to 'illegal immigrants' This is false. Democrats say they are pushing for the inclusion of key health care provisions in the next congressional spending package.

FACT FOCUS: Democrats did not shut down the government to give health care to illegal immigrants.

So sorry for your loss.

Do you work at the Office of Management and Budget? Do you know someone who does? Are you a current or former federal worker with information that you can share about Russell Vought?

If the answer to any of these is "yes," please contact @andykroll.bsky.social

www.propublica.org/tips/

Inside the Memphis Chamber of Commerce’s push for Elon Musk’s xAI data center Photo illustration by Shoshana Gordon/ProPublica. Source images: Andrea Morales/MLK50, screenshot by MLK50, U.S. Air Force photo by Trevor Cokley via

mlk50.com/2025/08/22/x...

In the face of intense public opposition, the Greater Memphis Chamber of Commerce has gone to unusual lengths to promote Musk’s facility: sending out a mailer, for the first time in recent memory, that includes misleading facts.

My latest on @mlk50.com and @propublica.org Local Reporting Network.

Including Memphis.

Imagine learning more about nonprofit journalism world and editing pieces that world reads and Mississippians need while training with the brilliant @ashtonpittman.bsky.social and other @mississippifreepress.org editors in a wonderful newsroom. This is a dream job for right candidate. Pass it on.

Trump Wants to Cut Tribal College Funding by Nearly 90%, Putting Them at Risk of Closing ProPublica found that Congress was underfunding tribal colleges by a quarter-billion dollars per year. Rather than fixing the problem, proposed federal funding cuts unveiled this week would devastate ...

NEW: A nearly 90% funding cut proposed by the Trump administration would likely shut down and devastate the 37 tribal colleges and universities created to serve the students disadvantaged by the nation’s historic mistreatment of Indigenous communities.

By @mattkrupnick.bsky.social

Illinois Lawmakers Ban Police From Ticketing and Fining Students for Minor Infractions in School The legislation comes after a ProPublica-Chicago Tribune investigation revealed that even though state law bans schools from fining students directly, districts skirt the law by calling on police to i...

Such fantastic impact!! Illinois Bans Police From Ticketing, Fining Students for Minor Infractions in School @jodiscohen.bsky.social @jsmithrichards.bsky.social

Under his eye.

Columbia Will Pay Survivors of Abusive Doctor $750 Million After ProPublica Revealed University’s Failures The sweeping deal means the Ivy League school’s settlements will total more than $1 billion for over 1,000 claims of sexual abuse by former patients of OB-GYN Robert Hadden, who worked at the universi...

NEW: Columbia University has agreed to a $750M settlement with nearly 600 patients of Robert Hadden, a former doctor who sexually abused them while working at the school.

A 2023 ProPublica investigation revealed how the school shielded the OB-GYN for decades.

This Lender Said Its Loans Would Help Tennesseans. It Has Sued More Than 110,000 of Them. The Flex Loan, a type of payday loan pioneered by Advance Financial, has burdened low-income borrowers while generating huge profits for lenders. Tennessee lawmakers declined to rein in the lending…

NEW: A Tennessee lender told legislators its new product, the Flex Loan, would help residents.

In the 10 years since getting approval for it, the company has sued over 110,000 borrowers.

With @tennesseelookout.com

F.B.I. Arrests Wisconsin Judge, Patel Says Judge Hannah Dugan was arrested on suspicion that she “intentionally misdirected federal agents away from” an immigrant being pursued by the authorities, the F.B.I. director said.

This seems like a huge deal. F.B.I. Director Kash Patel said on Friday that agents had arrested a county judge in Milwaukee on charges of obstructing immigration enforcement.

Trump’s War on Measurement Means Losing Data on Drug Use, Maternal Mortality, Climate Change and More By slashing teams that gather critical data, the administration has left the federal government with no way of understanding if policies are working — and created a black hole of information whose con...

DON’T LOOK AWAY! The Trump administration is catapulting us into a data black hole and the consequences could be massive. Halting data collection on drug use, maternal mortality, climate change, more, by @alecmac.bsky.social

“Slow Pay, Low Pay or No Pay” Blue Cross authorized mastectomies and breast reconstructions for women with cancer but refused to pay the full doctors’ bills. A jury called it fraud and awarded the practice $421 million.

Blue Cross denied payments for thousands of procedures involved in breast reconstruction. But it approved special deals for treatment for executives’ wives. 😳 @tchristianmiller.bsky.social

Committed to Justice. Rooted in Truth. Nobody does journalism like us. Support MLK50 with a $15 donation today. mlk50.co/3FrRsNG

Wendi C. Thomas Joins ProPublica as a Distinguished Fellow—And That’s Huge for Memphis A Journalism Powerhouse Returns Memphis’ own Wendi C. Thomas is back in the national spotlight, and this time, she’s rejoining ProPublica’s Distinguished Fellows program. The founder of MLK50: Justice...

This was a nice surprise. Thanks, Choose 901! choose901.com/wendi-c-thom...

Alex, you’re too kind.

Thanks, Dick.