It did not have legs.

🥇 First Place: Tony Bartelme, Glenn Smith, and John Dell'Osso of The Post and Courier for "Uncovered: Power & Polo/The Russians Next Door," an investigation of how powerful people from across the world exploit weak transparency laws.

Only Seto-kun can save us.

🇳🇬 🇺🇸 A group in #Nigeria is pressing for an investigation into assets held by Senator Orji Uzor Kalu. A court filing cites an investigation @tbartelme.bsky.social and I published last year exposing Uzor Kalu's properties in the Carolinas. cc: @pplaaf.bsky.social @acdatacollective.bsky.social

Our story last year about international investors with sketchy pasts has some impact in Nigeria. @johndellosso.bsky.social @pplaaf.bsky.social www.postandcourier.com/news/local_s...

To put this into perspective...

This is a great example of the power of FOIA.

👋 Come find us at #SunshineFest next week and see for yourself how we're using simulation games to promote transparency and accountability! Here's where we'll be... cc: @brechnerfoi.bsky.social @muckrock.com @knightfoundation.org

This email from #DOGE staffer Justin Fox (recently deposed in the NEH case) is shocking. Did he not understand separation of powers? Did he not know GAO is part of the legislative branch? The EO cites 5 USC 551, which clearly (and obviously) says: "but does not include— (A) the Congress;"

One of the best of all time. “You’re not stuck in traffic. You ARE traffic.” Wish we had come up with that one. #UrbanTruth

Underappreciated benefit of mindfulness: not thinking too much about the substance you just sat in on the bus until after you've put your clothes in the wash and showered.

Thank you A-Mark Foundation and SC Press Assoc. for recognizing our “Power and Polo” corp transparency project last year as SC’s top investigative journalism prize. with @glennsmith.bsky.social a d @johndellosso.bsky.social www.postandcourier.com/news/post-an...

Hot damn! We won an award. Bartelme and Smith, along with John Dell’Osso from the Platform to Protect Whistleblowers in Africa, won the A-Mark Prize for Investigative Journalism for “Power and Polo.”

🎶 Making war just for fun 🎶

This is worrisome.

I vividly remember the wonderment I felt as a young child when I heard this song for the first time on my clock radio.

Extraordinary work by @nickpdonovan.bsky.social, as usual!

We're grateful to @taicollab.bsky.social for mentioning the Investigative Simulations Lab in their weekly newsletter.

🌸 We'll be at Sunshine Fest in Washington, DC from March 15-17 talking about freedom of information and simulation games. Drop us a line if you'll be there and want to find a time to chat.

The low-budget indie that launched the careers of Wes Anderson and Luke and Owen Wilson wasn’t a hit, but it’s a Texas classic. Celebrating 30 years of 'Bottle Rocket': https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/bottle-rocket-turns-30-wes-anderson-owen-wilson/

Pour avoir déjà utilisé les simulations @johndellosso.bsky.social @investigativesimulations.org dans le cadre de formations, n’hésitez pas à le contacter et à travailler avec Investigative simulations Lab. It is fun and useful for anyone who wants to investigate companies #SeekTruth #HaveFun

Self-recommending. @johndellosso.bsky.social is an excellent investigator and this seems like a great way to train the next generation of bright young sleuths

Today I’m proud to launch the Investigative Simulations Lab (@investigativesimulations.org), an organization that designs and delivers simulation games that show journalists and researchers how to follow the money and uncover wrongdoing.

We recently helped our member @papertrailmedia.de report on a notorious US oligarch's acquisition of critical energy infrastructure in Germany.

The US Treasury Department has relaxed its rules on customer due diligence, telling financial institutions they no longer must identify the beneficial owner of a legal entity at each new account opening. www.mlex.com/mlex/financi...

The Trump administration is repurposing what’s left of USAID. My latest with the great Jon Landay www.reuters.com/world/us/whi...

Our new documentary, “How We Tracked a ‘Fake Prince’ Scammer to His Nigerian Mansion,” hit more than half a million views. We spoke to the journalist behind the story, who started investigating after a Romanian businesswoman believed she’d invested £200 million in a fake humanitarian foundation.

Creepy South Carolina Epstein story in today’s @postandcourier.bsky.social (Wait I guess they’re all creepy.) www.postandcourier.com/beaufort-cou...

This sounds familiar... 🤔 But growing a newsroom from the ground up takes time and money — and frankly, we need way more resources than we have now to fill this massive gap. You can help us build the newsroom D.C. deserves: 51st.news/signup

Appointed to protect Nigerians’ pension funds, Abdulrasheed Maina was convicted of laundering them. OCCRP, Premium Times, and @pplaaf.bsky.social have uncovered U.S. and Dubai properties he bought in cash before the conviction. None of them were seized by authorities: www.occrp.org/en/scoop/nig...

Our latest @postandcourier.bsky.social project is called "Forever Stained." On the surface, it's about "forever chemicals" and the carpet industry's role. But on deeper levels, it's about corporate responsibility and the importance of watchdogs. www.postandcourier.com/news/special...

I don't know what "holistic" means in this context. But, I know that today I watched several elderly people and families with young kids walking on major roads because massive snowbanks created by plows blocked sidewalks and bus stops.

DC politics getting lively.

sickos_yes.png

Fun fact. I recently sat next to this guy and one of his aides on a flight from Houston. They were talking about their Twitter posts pretty much the entire time.

‘The more that other countries look to escape US financial coercion, the more the US will scale it up… The global dollar system may now be a source of instability rather than stability.’ Our new paper by @dsquareddigest.bsky.social & @himself.bsky.social www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/documents/60...

Tomorrow’s front page of the Minnesota Star Tribune: Jan. 23, 2026

Hard to see this as anything other than a test run sweeping up all of a reporter's confidential files under the flimsy pretense of a leak investigation. Impossible not to have a chilling effect on sources who fear their identity could be outed by a gov't raid. www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

Great paper which goes beyond simple geopolitical analysis of the rise of Asia to a recognition that entrepots like Dubai offer English legal protections for dubious clients without the inconvenience of the rule of law. "Londongrad" turbocharged. www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/publications...

Everything old is new again

This week, a man in ICE custody bravely went on the record telling me he witnessed guards choking another detainee to death -- an account supported by medical examiner findings. Now, DHS is trying to deport him and another one of my sources. Gift link: wapo.st/4qR1T1U

Two of Trump's confidantes are shareholders in a business that stands to gain from U.S. involvement in Greenland, newest from me and Kevin Hall @occrp.org www.occrp.org/en/scoop/as-...

Photo by Pierre Lavie. Yes this is me. And I threw my Leica. It landed on the bass plate with hardly a scratch. Another Photographer grabbed it along with my phone and I was able to track him later. I was held face down tear gas deployed right in front of me and pepper sprayed directly into the eye.

It's perhaps a bit much, but finding a lot of relevant symbolism in this show for the current moment. In particular, this guy...

The Washington Post Guild is alarmed and appalled by federal law enforcement’s search and seizure of reporter Hannah Natanson’s property and personal devices. Hannah is a valued member of our union whose work covering the federal workforce has been essential (1/3)

For no particular reason...

This is the kind of thing an authoritarian regime does. www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...

C'est une première "historique" selon Gérald Darmanin. Dubaï a accepté de saisir, à la demande du parquet de Marseille 33 biens immobiliers appartenant à des trafiquants marseillais (et non 82 comme annoncé par le ministre). Le détail, les coulisses et les enjeux de cette victoire inédite ⬇️