Mary Papenfuss
Mary Papenfuss covers the collision of Trump-era politics, media, and public spectacle for Yahoo News. Her work zeroes in on moments when political power, ego, and image clash in public, often through sharp headlines and tightly written stories. She tracks how Republican leaders, their allies, and their critics use media, social platforms, and staged events to shape the narrative around Donald Trump and his circle.
Trump, public image and spectacle
Papenfuss returns repeatedly to stories that capture Trump’s public image under stress, especially in front of crowds and cameras. Recent pieces follow him being loudly booed at a college football game in Tennessee, with attention on the scale of the crowd and the reaction he draws.
She writes about his appearances with close aides such as Natalie Harp, describing scenes where his focus drifts from the event to the loyal staffer at his side.
Other coverage follows Trump’s attempts to control access and punish critics, including reports on his bans and exclusions of media outlets and his confused explanations of those bans. She also highlights his failed ambitions, such as a “crackpot” push to control Greenland, framing the outcome as a humiliation rather than a routine policy defeat.
Even when she turns to his online activity, such as a posting spree imagining himself entertaining George Washington in a new White House ballroom, the emphasis is on the surreal gap between his fantasies and unfolding crises around him. In pieces like her state fair coverage, she treats campaign-style outings as set pieces that reveal his taste, priorities, and vulnerability to bad optics.
Media, influencers and the online right
A core strand of Papenfuss’s work sits at the intersection of politics and media, where cable news, influencers, and platforms both challenge and enable Trump.
She covers segments like a CNN montage that lays out Trump’s shifting China narrative, writing about how television edits and archives can undercut his messaging. Her reporting on “cowardly” White House reporters who decline to sanction Trump over outlet bans looks at the press as an institution wrestling with how far to push back. She extends that lens to the online right and its personalities, profiling figures such as Andrew Tate as they issue public demands and warnings to Trump while entangled in their own legal trouble.
Similar pieces examine Elon Musk’s role in election meddling allegations and his reaction to a documentary scrutinizing his ties to Trump’s campaign, treating the tech executive as part of the wider ecosystem of powerful allies and amplifiers. Across these stories, Papenfuss writes about how images, edited clips, posts, and headlines circulate between the White House, platforms, and newsrooms, shaping the political battlefield as much as formal speeches or legislation.
Republican figures, rhetoric and ambition
Papenfuss’s beat reaches beyond Trump himself into the broader Republican leadership that surrounds him.
She has written on Vice President JD Vance’s remarks about America becoming “dirtier and poorer,” focusing on how critics interpret the language as a racist dog whistle. She covers House Speaker Mike Johnson’s Newsmax interview, freezing the moment where his talk of “crazy people” in office runs alongside footage of Trump, and uses that juxtaposition to highlight the party’s awkward relationship with its own leader.
In a piece on “ICE Barbie” and a notorious ally teasing 2028 plans with a hunting video and tagged rivals, she reads the imagery and coded statements as early positioning for future campaigns. These stories are often built around a single quote, clip, or post, but they situate that moment inside a pattern of hard-edged rhetoric, culture-war signaling, and personal ambition.
Papenfuss’s language is consistently vivid, and her framing tends to underline hypocrisy, extremity, or self-inflicted embarrassment in the way these figures talk and maneuver.
Investigations, law enforcement and global fallout
Alongside her core Trump and Republican coverage, Papenfuss sometimes writes on investigations and the consequences of propaganda beyond Washington. In one recent piece on the kidnapping of Nancy Guthrie, she focuses on procedural missteps, tensions between local detectives and federal agents, and decisions that may have compromised the crime scene, reflecting her interest in how institutions handle high-stakes cases.
Another story follows an American farmer who embraced Russian government messaging, then faces deportation after turning against officials, showing how a political system can first elevate and then punish a foreign supporter.
These articles are more straight-ahead in tone but still fit her broader concern with power, accountability, and the human cost of political gamesmanship. They demonstrate a willingness to leave the Trump-centered spotlight when a case or character exposes similar dynamics of control, loyalty, and backlash.
Across these strands, Papenfuss works in a fast-turn, incident-driven format. Her stories are short, built around a fresh event, broadcast clip, or social post, and anchored by strong verbs and sharp characterizations. She returns again and again to Trump, his allies, and his critics, using their words and staging to show how modern politics plays out as spectacle, conflict with the press, and an ongoing struggle over who controls the story.
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.