Claudia Levens
Claudia Levens covers how public decisions and private projects reshape local communities, with a focus on the politics of development, energy and infrastructure across suburbs and county government. She reports for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel as a communities and county government reporter, bringing a politics lens to local land use, budgets and the growing artificial intelligence data center industry. Her work spans breaking news, enterprise pieces and features that track how policy choices and corporate investments filter down to everyday life.
AI data centers, energy and local oversight
Levens is a primary reporter on the region’s emerging AI data center boom, following projects from the first proposal through regulatory decisions and community reaction. She has co-written coverage of Oracle’s plan to power a Port Washington data center campus with nuclear energy, explaining how a long-term purchase agreement from a nearby plant could translate into hundreds of millions of dollars in fuel cost savings for utility customers.
In that reporting, she connects corporate strategy to utility regulation and ratepayer impacts, making clear where public agencies and private companies intersect.
Her recent stories trace how developers pitching a 3.5-gigawatt data center campus seek new generation assets and grid upgrades, and how state lawmakers move to clear statutory roadblocks to attract more such facilities. She foregrounds residents living near these projects, documenting their concerns about climate and environmental risks, the development process and the sense of powerlessness that can accompany large-scale infrastructure decisions.
Across these pieces, she examines the balance between economic promises, energy policy and the guardrails - or lack of guardrails - around rapidly expanding AI infrastructure.
Suburban development and land use
Levens consistently reports on how new developments and land-use decisions change the shape of suburbs, from downtown districts to regional malls. Her coverage of a mixed-use project like the Meridian follows a $24 million development from groundbreaking, detailing how housing, retail and public space are being combined in a single site and what that means for local growth.
She has produced inside looks at new grocery projects, including a Sendik’s store where she walks readers through the layout and unfinished work ahead of a grand opening, tying the store’s arrival to the evolution of the surrounding commercial corridor.
At Bayshore, she has reported on an expansive fitness and wellness center filling one of the mall’s largest long-term vacancies, highlighting how a 50,000-square-foot gym repositions the property and introduces new ideas about health and community use of a former retail space. Her stories on a proposed CAVA restaurant in Glendale and a new Carhartt store at Bayshore treat chain openings as local development decisions, noting how these tenants fit into broader efforts to reposition shopping districts and draw different customer bases.
In Bayside, she has covered how officials turn to goats for landscaping and stormwater management, showing how even small-scale environmental moves reflect local priorities around infrastructure and resilience.
Local business openings and community economy
Beyond large projects, Levens tracks smaller business openings that signal shifts in neighborhood economies and commercial mix. Her reporting on a new pizzeria from the owners of an established restaurant details the reuse of a long-vacant storefront and the concept they plan for the space, situating the venture within the changing dining scene along a key commercial avenue. She covers restaurant, retail and fitness openings not as lifestyle curiosities but as decisions that affect employment, foot traffic and the character of local business districts.
These pieces often note how new tenants replace shuttered operations or repurpose large-format spaces, framing each announcement within the longer story of how suburbs manage vacancies and pursue redevelopment. She brings the same attention to detail to smaller environmental and infrastructure stories, such as the goat-powered landscaping initiative, treating them as part of the community’s economic and policy fabric rather than isolated novelties.
County government, budgets and political decision-making
Levens also covers county government, focusing on how budget decisions and policy debates shape services and infrastructure. Her author profile describes work on increasing municipal budgets, competitive local elections and the reversal of affordable housing projects, indicating a sustained interest in how political decisions affect housing and local governance.
She has explored a looming county budget shortfall and the financial challenges facing the transit system, connecting these issues to the repercussions of changes in federal funding.
Across her government coverage, she reports on lawsuits, contentious cases involving officials and the role of tech companies planning major data centers, maintaining a clear line from institutional choices to on-the-ground impacts.
The range of topics - from elections and budgets to infrastructure and AI facilities - underscores that her politics beat is grounded in local institutions and their decisions, rather than in national horse-race coverage. Her consistent focus is on how power is exercised at the municipal and county level, and how those choices shape communities she covers.
4 more politics journalists.
A.D. Quig
A.D. Quig follows money and power through Chicago and Cook County government, showing how political decisions, taxes and public spending affect residents and businesses. At the Chicago Tribune, she covers city and county politics, municipal finance, tax policy, budgets and the structures shaping mayoral and council authority. She joined the Tribune in 2022 after covering politics for Crain’s Chicago Business and The Daily Line. Her work examines council power, ethics rules, police leadership, tax incentives, public agencies and pandemic aid. She has reported on data center tax breaks, property tax errors, federal relief spending and the fiscal effects of major development proposals. Quig combines insider government reporting with public accountability journalism. She uses public records, data and budget documents, follows committees and staff negotiations, and explains complex decisions in plain language with precise numbers and a direct link to everyday consequences.
Adam Daly
Adam Daly covers politics for amNewYork with a focus on the inner workings of city and state government and the low-profile forums where power is exercised and negotiated. He reports on commissions and panels that shape how New York is governed, treating charter reform and government efficiency as central political terrain. His coverage of moves to replace an Adams-era charter commission with a new government efficiency panel foregrounds mandate, authority, and what “efficiency” means in practice for agencies and services. He tracks who gains and loses influence when one commission supplants another and which constituencies are being answered to. Daly explains dense procedural questions in clear, reader-facing terms, using specific institutional details and occasional wordplay to connect jargon-heavy reforms to public spending, service delivery, and mayoral power.
Adam Pack
Adam Pack covers Capitol Hill through power struggles, investigations and ideological fights, focusing on how Congress intersects with Donald Trump’s agenda. He is a politics writer on Fox News Digital’s Capitol Hill team, covering Congress, federal elections, legislative battles, election rules, war powers, primaries and intraparty fights. He previously wrote for the Daily Caller News Foundation. His reporting examines deadlines, vote counts, bill language, campaign spending, court rulings, oversight reports, culture clashes and emerging issues such as AI-backed political groups. He has covered FISA reauthorization, defense spending, the SAVE America Act, housing policy, redistricting, candidate absences, primary spending and disputes over sex, gender, religion and race-based caucuses. He reports primarily through news features and investigative-style pieces built around documents, committee reports, court records, unearthed video and specific legislative details. He often co-writes complex Capitol Hill stories and publishes “FIRST ON FOX” exclusives.
Adam Sullivan
Adam Sullivan is a veteran politics reporter for WCAX who connects elections and party disputes to everyday life. He covers statewide races, party primaries, federal representation, political rhetoric, extremism, and accountability across the Upper Valley and neighboring states. His reporting includes Becca Balint’s victory over Molly Gray in the Democratic U.S. House primary to replace Congressman Peter Welch. He also reports when political controversies affect public safety, political culture, towns, and institutions, including a New Hampshire Libertarian Party post endorsing violence against elected Democrats. Sullivan follows cultural stories with civic consequences, such as Noah Kahan’s appeal to fans to stop stealing a Strafford road sign linked to his music. He writes straight news centered on concrete events, official reactions, political context, community impact, and what comes next.