Subject: Coming soon to the Hill
Team,
There’s no doubt that POLITICO produces the best coverage of Congress of any news outlet, anywhere. Readers turn to us to understand the inside story of what’s happening on Capitol Hill and why.
Yet there’s so much more we can and plan to do to illuminate the byzantine and often confounding ways legislating gets done in America today. That’s why we’re so excited to unveil our newest initiative: Congress Minutes, POLITICO’s real-time guide to Capitol Hill.
And we’re pleased to announce two extraordinary new members of the Congress team to help steer it: Anthony Adragna and Nancy Vu.
They’ll be joining a team that has chronicled the tumultuous 117th Congress with aplomb, from the trauma of Jan. 6 to GOP leadership upheaval to a bipartisan breakthrough on infrastructure. They’ve met the moment with a slew of definitive scoops -- on the House, the Senate, the Capitol Police and beyond -- not to mention narrative-setting features that unlock the complexities of Hill power struggles and policy debates.
They’ll now have an exciting new tool for narrating the day in Congress, taking what they do better than anyone on the beat — accurate and insightful coverage of everything going on under the dome — and meeting readers in the moment.
What is it: Minutes is an award-winning, mobile-first platform built by our own newsroom development team, debuted last year during the political conventions. A great team – including Andrew McGill, Andrew Briz, Lily Mihalik, Ali Manzano, Paul Volpe, Luiza Savage and others – adapted and enhanced it to better serve the time-starved powerbrokers in and around Capitol Hill, helping them get quick updates and intel on what’s going on during the course of their day. Minutes will capture the tone and urgency of the Huddle newsletter at its best: lively, clear and confident — with a dose or two of humor about the land of late-night stakeouts and last-minute showdowns. Launch date is September 20.
Anthony Adragna is moving to the Congress team after an impressive run covering energy and the environment, leading that group’s congressional coverage and helming Morning Energy for several years. He’s covered the biggest climate politics fights of the last decade in Congress, from the Keystone XL pipeline to the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan to President Joe Biden's renewed push for aggressive climate change action. Over the past year and a half, he's also become a double threat as the host of the POLITICO Energy podcast.
Before joining POLITICO, Anthony covered climate and energy for half a decade at Bloomberg BNA. When not skulking around the Senate subways or the halls of Rayburn, Anthony enjoys watching his beloved Washington Nationals alongside his wife, Meghan, and pup Socks. A graduate of Middlebury College, Anthony is also the rarest of all unicorns: a D.C. native.
Nancy Vu joins the Congress team as the producer of Minutes, responsible for harnessing the latest and greatest digital tools at our disposal. Coming to POLITICO in the midst of the pandemic from Howard University, Nancy began as an editorial intern and helped cover a number of environmental issues, such as the clean energy transition, climate initiatives and the Biden administration’s green promises. She wowed everyone with her tireless work ethic, rigorous attention to detail, and drive to succeed — so we hired her as a full-time member of Jess Cuellar’s team. Nancy graduated summa cum laude from Howard, racking up honors along the way, including: a White House Correspondents’ Association scholarship, a Paul Robeson award, and a first place trophy in interviewing from the HBCU Speech and Debate National Championship.
In her free time (when she has any), you will often find Nancy reading historical novels, decorating her new apartment, or hitting the gym. As of right now, her guilty pleasure is curling up with a glass of wine and binge-watching old teen dramas, such as “Degrassi: The Next Generation.”
Please join us in congratulating Anthony and Nancy on their new assignments. And we look forward to your feedback and ideas once we rollout our new Minutes news platform in the coming weeks.
Blake
Elana
Matt