Washington Post Blogger Greg Sargent Wins February Sidney for Coverage of Protests in Wisconsin | Hillman Foundation

Washington Post Blogger Greg Sargent Wins February Sidney for Coverage of Protests in Wisconsin

Washington Post Blogger Greg Sargent Wins February Sidney for Coverage of Protests in Wisconsin

March 15, 2011

NEW YORK: The Sidney Hillman Foundation announced today that Washington Post blogger Greg Sargent has won the February Sidney Award for his extraordinary reporting about the Republican assault on public sector employees in Wisconsin.

Sargent is the author of “The Plum Line” at washingtonpost.com.

His comprehensive coverage of the protests ranged from reporting on the latest polls–“68 percent of independents [in Wisconsin] want Governor Walker to compromise”–to getting the conservative Cato Institute to admit that an ad produced by Karl Rove’s PAC had completely distorted Cato’s statistics.

Sidney Award Judge Charles Kaiser said, “Sargent’s minute-by-minute coverage of every detail of the crisis in the labor movement made his blog required reading for everyone following this crucial story.”

Sargent, who is 43, is a former reporter for The New York Observer and a former columnist for New York magazine. After a short stint at The American Prospect, he spent two years working with Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo, where he covered his first presidential campaign in 2008, which “turned out to be the most thrilling and historic campaign in decades,” Sargent said.

Sargent started writing “The Plum Line” at the beginning of 2009 for “Who Runs Gov,” a Washington Post-owned website. At the beginning of 2010, Washington Post editorial editor Fred Hiatt moved Sargent’s blog to the online opinion section of the Post.

Sargent lives outside Washington, D.C. with his wife, Rachel Waugh, and their son Robbie.

For an interview with Sargent about his blog’s coverage of the crisis, please go here.

The Sidney Award is given once a month to an outstanding piece of socially-conscious journalism, or a leading journalistic association, by the Sidney Hillman Foundation, which also awards the annual Hillman Prizes every spring. For more information please click here.

Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!