Reporter
Isaac Arnsdorf covers national politics.
His reporting on President Trump's agenda for veterans won the Sidney Hillman Foundation's Sidney Award and the National Press Club's Sandy Hume Award, and was an honorable mention for the Toner Prize for Excellence in Political Reporting.
Before joining ProPublica in 2017, he covered lobbying and campaign finance at Politico. He previously worked for Bloomberg News.
“This situation reeks of corruption and cronyism,” said the top Democrat on the House veterans committee.
How Marvel Entertainment chairman Ike Perlmutter and two other Mar-a-Lago cronies are secretly shaping the Trump administration’s veterans policies.
The hedge fund billionaire’s efforts to assist veterans with PTSD have thrust him into the fight over privatizing the VA and led some people to question his motives.
John Kelly told veterans groups last week that President Trump decided to remove VA secretary David Shulkin, despite the administration’s insistence that Shulkin resigned. The dispute could have legal implications for VA policies.
Firings surged at the Veterans Affairs Department last year in the wake of a new law. Now the president wants to replicate that legislation across the federal government.
For the first time, political appointee and federal financial disclosure information is publicly searchable.
Even before a searing report put the job of Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin at risk, some White House staffers were pushing a health care agenda at odds with his. The infighting has left vets frustrated, Congress confused — and a key piece of legislation stalemated.
Since the election, President Trump has made 31 specific claims about companies adding or saving American jobs thanks to his intervention. We went back to see what’s become of those announcements.
The overture follows an intense and secretive lobbying push involving Michael Flynn, Tom Barrack, Rick Gates and even Iran-Contra figure Robert McFarlane.
The Bureau of Indian Affairs official was overseeing a loan program that was in litigation over a loan guarantee he obtained while in private business.
A government watchdog found irregularities in a loan guarantee arranged by Gavin Clarkson for an Indian tribe. Now Clarkson is in charge of the program that is on the hook for the mess.
The special counsel wanted to question a Turkish businessman with interests in Turkey, Russia and the U.S. — and ties to people with criminal records.
The attorney general mischaracterized Obama-era restrictions while citing a study that actually says new computers reduce crime more than heavy weapons do.
The administration continues to quietly hire political staffers — more than 1,000 so far, many of them regulating industries they previously worked for — but we’ve uncovered more identities. “The swamp continues,” says a Trump campaign official who is now a lobbyist.
Analysts tracking Russian influence operations find a feedback loop between Kremlin propaganda and far-right memes.
Rinat Akhmetshin once worked for military intelligence in the former Soviet Union. He says he’s long retired from that work, but some American officials suspect he still has ties to Russian intelligence.
Dmitri “David” Zaikin made Russian energy deals with powerful officials, advised Eastern European parties drifting toward Russia, brokered condos at Toronto’s Trump Tower, and teamed up with the guy who hired Michael Flynn.
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