ProPublica announced that Keri Blakinger and Raquel Rutledge have been hired as reporters on the national desk. Rutledge starts Aug. 25, and Blakinger begins on Sept. 8.

“We are thrilled to welcome these two powerhouse reporters to our team,” said senior editor Sarah Childress. “Both Keri and Raquel are gifted storytellers and relentless reporters with track records of doing just the kind of impactful reporting we need now. I look forward to working with them.”

Blakinger joins ProPublica after stints at the Houston Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times and The Marshall Project. She has written extensively about the criminal justice system for more than a decade. In 2024, she was named a Pulitzer finalist in feature writing for her story on the Dungeons & Dragons players of Texas’ death row, which The Marshall Project published in collaboration with The New York Times Magazine.

In 2022, while at The Marshall Project, Blakinger worked with a team of ProPublica reporters to examine officials’ misleading claims about Operation Lone Star, a multibillion-dollar border initiative launched by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. The newsrooms’ joint series was named Star Investigative Report of the Year by the Headliners Foundation of Texas.

Blakinger’s work has appeared in outlets including the BBC, Vice and The Washington Post Magazine, where her reporting on women in jail helped earn the publication a 2020 National Magazine Award for best single-topic issue. The following year, her coverage of the effects of the pandemic in U.S. jails was named a National Magazine Award finalist.

In addition to her writing, Blakinger produced the short documentary “I Am Ready, Warden,” which was nominated for a 2025 Academy Award. She is a 2025 New America Fellow and the author of “Corrections in Ink,” a critically acclaimed 2022 memoir about her time in prison and her path to criminal justice reporting. She will be based in Los Angeles.

“I’m delighted to join ProPublica and to have the opportunity to work with some of the finest investigative journalists in the industry,” Blakinger said. “I’ve admired their work from afar for years, and I am honored to join the organization at such a pivotal moment.”

Rutledge comes to ProPublica from The Examination, a nonprofit newsroom she helped to launch in 2023 after nearly 20 years as an investigative reporter and deputy editor at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

During her time at the Journal Sentinel, Rutledge covered a variety of subjects from health and science to crime and taxes. Her investigation into fraud and abuse in Wisconsin’s day care subsidy program won the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting and resulted in a state and federal crackdown. In 2012, Rutledge studied food regulation as a 2012 Nieman Fellow at Harvard University.

In 2022, she led an investigation into electrical fires in Milwaukee, uncovering how they hit Black renters hardest and how lawmakers and regulators do little to address the problem. That series, “Wires and Fires,” was named a finalist for the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Public Service.

Rutledge partnered with Ken Armstrong (formerly of ProPublica) to co-author the tragic narrative of a young mother who unwittingly rented a home from a landlord who had a history of building code violations. “The Landlord & the Tenant” won a 2023 National Magazine Award. Raquel will be based in Milwaukee for ProPublica.

“I’m beyond excited to get back to what I love most about journalism — digging into records, talking with sources, uncovering hidden truths and helping hold governments and corporations accountable when they cause harm,” Rutledge said. “I’m especially grateful for the chance to do this at this important time in our nation’s history and alongside the incredible team at ProPublica, whose dedication and talent have long inspired me.”