Congressional Correspondent Susan Ferrechio joins the podcast this week to talk about what it’s like to cover Capitol Hill. We discuss the ins and outs of talking to members of Congress “on record” as well as some of the most interesting stories she’s written in her career. Susan also provides some inside information on the politics and friendships behind the scenes and shares tips for aspiring journalists.
Susan Ferrechio is the national politics correspondent for The Washington Times. She is a frequent guest on Fox News Media Buzz. She has previously reported for Congressional Quarterly and the Miami Herald.
TRANSCRIPT
Beverly Hallberg:
And welcome to She Thinks, a podcast where you’re allowed to think for yourself. I’m your host, Beverly Hallberg, and on today’s episode, Congressional Correspondent Susan Ferrechio joins us to talk about what it’s like to cover Capitol Hill. We’ll discuss the ins and outs of talking to members of Congress on record, as well as some of the most interesting stories she’s written in her career. Susan also is going to provide us with some inside information on the politics and friendships behind the scenes, as well as give some tips for aspiring journalists. But before we get into the conversation, a little bit more about Susan. Susan Ferrechio is the National Politics Correspondent for The Washington Times. She’s a frequent guest on Fox News’s Media Buzz, and she’s previously reported for Congressional Quarterly and the Miami Herald. Susan, it is a pleasure to have you on She Thinks.
Susan Ferrechio:
Great to be on. Thanks for inviting me.
Beverly Hallberg:
So why don’t we start by you giving us a little bit of background as far as how long you have been reporting on issues related to Capitol Hill. I know the Senate was one of your big beats for a while, and why you decided to get into this field.
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, I’ve been covering Congress and national politics and government, basically, for more than 30 years, and I started out as an intern at CNN in 1992, right when that presidential election year was heating up. And then I moved on to newspapers and worked my way up from small local paper up to more national level papers, bigger papers, and then finally into steadier beat covering national politics, Congress, government in general, and campaigns. So I’ve covered a real wide range of things for a really long time. That’s what I’ve been doing consistently. I never left the field; I’ve just been doing this straight away for I guess now going on 31 years. So it’s been a long time, but it’s been a big learning experience, obviously, that you really learn along the way. Yeah.
Beverly Hallberg:
And there’s so much that has changed in those three decades. I want to start just from the technology standpoint. So much has changed about technology, and part of that is just how big of a role social media plays. Something I often tell my clients when I’m talking to them about getting on TV is you have to have a Twitter account because so much of news is created via Twitter these days and what people are tweeting. Every media person is on Twitter. So what have you said about trying to keep up to date with the technology?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, that’s true. I mean, it’s not just Twitter, it’s like all the social media platforms. People are on Instagram and Facebook and TikTok, controversially, and just every social media platform trying to promote their work. And it is really helpful because it helps draw people to your news site. A lot of times people are getting this information mostly, not from going directly to a news site, although that still is part of the way people get their news, but they do see it on social media, especially young people. They’re not clicking on news sites, they’re seeing things on their social media streams, and that’s where they’re getting their news. So we have to be part of that. If you’re not going to be part of that, then you’re not going to be part of modern-day news. And it’s tricky though, too, because as I always like to say, there are no editors on social media, so you have to watch. You can tweet things, but you may be engaging people more directly than you might want.
And that’s a lot of what goes on on Twitter these days. It’s like this big mean fight all the time, but it’s a great also place to showcase your work and to promote your work. And people will have a chance to see your story in the morning if you’re tweeting it out or tweeting out your colleague’s stories or putting them on Instagram or Facebook. And it does help. It draws eyes to the site, and it gives your stories more prominence and more views than it maybe would get otherwise. So social media, I think, is everything in modern-day journalism. I don’t think modern-day journalism really knows how to deal with social media quite effectively, but nonetheless, that’s where we are. It’s transformed the medium completely, and there’s no doubt about that. And so you have to be part of it. I just am not sure everyone has a great idea of exactly how we should be part of it yet; it’s a learning process even now.
Beverly Hallberg:
Well, from a reporter’s perspective and just following reporters out there, you look at who’s doing it well and who’s not doing it well. And unfortunately, I think some bad traits are highlighted and rewarded, such as going viral because of provocative takes. And so I’ve seen this weird thing happen on social media where maybe the article that somebody who’s supposed to be a straight reporter has written is very much just with the news, and then they tweet it out and give a very clear opinion on what they think about the story itself. Can you talk a little bit about that, trying to find that fine line of Twitter, especially as a reporter with how much…. Or maybe this is a better question, how have you been able to remain in that pocket of just straight reporting without your own personal opinions and preferences seeping in, either into the article, the piece you’re writing, or on social media?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, I’ve occasionally wandered outside the lines myself. I think most reporters have, and you learn really quickly that it might not be worth the fight. I mean, I already have a platform. My platform is The Washington Times, and I have editors there and people I collaborate with constantly. And I know The Washington Times doesn’t want me spouting my viewpoints on things because who’s going to trust me if I come out strongly for or against something and then I have to report on it? I think what you have to do is, well, first of all, I have an easy way out. I can tweet my stories and just say, “Here it is. You tell me what you think or what you like or don’t like.” And that’s one way of doing it.
And the other way is it just…try to sound like you are a fair person when you are talking about a subject. And that really can be hard to do because, like I said, there are no editors on Twitter, and reporters have gotten in trouble with their…. And some have been fired over the years for things they’ve tweeted out because they just look like they’re not credible anymore as an objective journalist. I don’t know what the answer is other than just remember your job and remember, would what you’re tweeting out be something you would want to see in print or online at your news site? Would it be acceptable? You’re tweeting as a professional, although some people say retweets are not my opinion or whatever.
Beverly Hallberg:
They are.
Susan Ferrechio:
But you can look at a reporter’s retweets and get an idea of where they are and stand on things. We’re not robots either. So Twitter’s here, social media is here, and I don’t know that there’s an easy answer here. I don’t think there’s a black and white answer. And I think it’s something that is still being, it’s like a work in progress with journalists and Twitter, and I don’t think you’re ever going to get to the point where you’re going to have just nothing but neutral tweets from journalists. I don’t think you’re going to see that. I think it’s just going to be what it is right now, which is people trying to feel their way on this thing and some people getting in trouble or occasionally tweeting out things that are controversial. But if you’re starting out in the profession, especially, I mean you just want to be careful of that because social media is a professional tool as well.
People see what you’re putting out there. I can’t tell you how often I go and look…. You know, prospective candidates, the first thing you do is you look at their social media account, you just see what kind of stories they’re writing and what are they tweeting, what are they saying? It’s just a natural thing to do when people, it’s like young people going to college and then they getting in trouble over their social media stuff that they tweeted when they’re 15 years old. If you’re a professional in the field, you want to just think about everything you tweet before you tweet it. And how do you want to sound? Do you want to throw your personal opinion out there, or how is it you’re tweeting, as a professional or as just somebody who’s not in the field? And I think if you are a journalist, you really can’t tweet your personal feelings, and that’s just the way it is. You have to kind of really hold back.
Beverly Hallberg:
I really think so. Yeah, I think social media platforms are the best references when an employer is looking for an employee. Just check out their social media accounts to see what they would put out there. So I want to get into just the day in the life of a reporter. Of course, when people see the final product that you put out there, they think, “okay, you just wrote something.” But what is it like to report? I know you’ve done some time on Capitol Hill, you’ve done some time reporting living elsewhere. Especially on Capitol Hill, your work there, what is a day in the life when you’re working on a story?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, a lot of the action on Capitol Hill takes place outside the two chambers. It’s in, it’s…. Capitol Hill is 535 elected people and two chambers. And it’s all broken up into parties and factions and sub factions and gangs and the Senate. And you have to develop an understanding of all those things and an understanding of the individual players and how groups can influence legislation, how individuals can influence legislation. And you have to keep all that in mind every day when you’re covering Congress and you have to…. Most days are just spent interviewing people and having conversations and finding out what’s going on. And oftentimes reporters will be tracking, maybe they’re tracking a bill to see if it’s going to gain momentum. And so they’re tracking members to find out where they stand. Maybe there’s a big scandal, and they’re chasing down a lawmaker who’s suddenly under federal investigation; that can be part of your day. Or maybe you’re covering leadership elections, and you’re just trying to figure out who’s got the power, who’s got the backing to be the next party leader.
A lot of things involve not sitting down and watching the floor, which you would think, “Well wait, it’s Capitol Hill, it’s what you do.” No, it’s actually everything that’s going on outside there that influences what you see in a chamber. And then of course, you also have to know how to cover legislation as it moves through the House and the Senate and how to follow that and how to follow what happens when you are in the chamber, which there’s a lot to know and it’s, there’s a lot of people involved in a lot of ways that they can influence outcomes. So it’s like a gigantic chess board, really. And you’re just figuring out where everybody’s moving around all the time, and that’s what the reporters do every day.
We all know where the various meetings are being held, and there’s a rhythm to it, I guess, of when people are meeting and what’s happening every week. You get into that rhythm and you know where to be standing in order to talk to people. And then you…. I think reporters on Capitol Hill do this, and I wish they did it less, which is they tend to operate as a group and everyone’s following the same story, and they lean on each other to figure out what’s going on, which is necessary. And believe me, it’s very hard to know every little thing is going on, and we rely on each other.
Beverly Hallberg:
So how does that work when you’re also competing against other reporters? They work for different news outlets, so what is that balance of helping each other out because everybody needs help at one point in time, but wanting to write the better story because it’s your job on the line, many cases, how much you’re followed and how well your stories are liked.
Susan Ferrechio:
Yeah, that’s true. And a lot of times, if everyone’s working on the same story about a piece of legislation or they’re trying to write about something happening that everyone’s writing about, you’re not seeing a lot of scoops, but then you also might want to cover something separately. It’s a big building, so you can get lawmakers alone in various hallways if you stand at the right place at the right time; you catch them alone and then you can ask some questions and write a little story that other people don’t have or get exclusives just by…. I used to get a lot of exclusives just by being the last person there.
I would stand outside the speaker’s office until eight o’clock at night, and I would be there when that speaker walked out, and I would get a story, and I would find out what was going on. And that is really in some ways how you can get the job done there, just outlasting people. It’s an exhausting job. You’re on your feet all day; the floors are granite, stone, whatever they’re made of. It can be a tough environment to be on your feet all day, but a lot of it is just hustle. The reporters who hustle get the better stories.
Beverly Hallberg:
And any tricks that you could talk about, about getting a lawmaker to speak to you, especially, let’s say there is some kind of scandal or there’s something they don’t want to talk about, how would you get a lawmaker to talk to you?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, and you got to build relationships too. And one way to build relationships is to talk to them often. So I got some of my best stories from relationships I developed over long periods of time. And that means being at the votes. And in working these relationships where you’re talking to people all the time about things that aren’t about a big scandal, you develop relationships. I think that is a key to being a good Capitol Hill reporter. And there’s a lot of people, so you got to do a lot of footwork. You got to be out there on Monday night at eight o’clock at these votes and talking to people late at night about what’s going on, and they come to see you as someone they want to talk to.
And that’s one way of doing it. It’s a job, like I said; it requires real hustle, and it requires dedication to wanting to build relationships with people. The people that got the best stories, in my view, and my ability to get some really good stories, came from just working the hallways. And in the old days, it was working the phones. But on Capitol Hill, you got to be there in person, talking to people all the time. And you will build relationships, and you’ll get some good stuff just by being around and listening.
Beverly Hallberg:
And not burning your contacts. Meaning if somebody trusts you to be discreet or to be off the record, holding true to those standards so that they’re willing to talk to you, correct?
Susan Ferrechio:
Right, right. You have to establish those boundaries and rules and all that, if someone says they don’t want you to use their name or whatever. And that’s another big controversial thing, these unnamed sources that I have a real problem with how they’re identified in some of our modern-day journalism, but that’s part of it as well. And Washington is all about the unnamed source, and I’m not a huge fan of that. Because if you don’t know your source, you don’t know their motive, and you don’t know why they’re saying what they’re saying. So I think that if you’re going to use somebody as an unnamed source, you should at least give some identifying information like their political party so people can get an idea of why they might be saying something or maybe a little more of an ID so they can get a better idea of why they’re weighing in on this. And that’s also a part of being a reporter, trying to figure out those parameters as well so that your readers have some sense that they can trust what you’re reporting, too.
Beverly Hallberg:
So for people who are reading, let’s say a new article that comes out, there is only one unnamed source, and you don’t have any type of descriptor about who this person is, should you not trust that piece? And if not, should it just be as long as there is a descriptor of an unnamed source? Or do you think several unnamed sources, if they’re going to be unnamed, you need to have several in order to trust the validity of the piece?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, what party do they belong to? Why are they saying what they’re saying? Where did they come from? I would just go back to the most recent example of how this was abused, in my view, was all the reporting on the Russian collusion stories with President Trump. And I knew what those sources were, too, and I knew how those stories came about and how, in my view, how fraudulent and politically motivated they were. And I said it at the time, I said it publicly, I said it in TV appearances, that I thought this was BS, a lot of the sourcing on this, because I knew the motive of the people, and it didn’t…. And I knew the way that it was being interpreted, and it wasn’t right to me, the way that these news outlets were reporting it. I thought it was inaccurate and unfair and misleading.
So I don’t care if you have 10 unnamed sources; you can find 10 unnamed sources who would say all kinds of things about people, but what might their motive be? And that’s where you, gatekeeper as the reporter, you have to be able to be fair about that. You have to be fair about why someone would be willing to come forward and say this. And viewers just need to know that, even if they don’t know the person’s name.
Beverly Hallberg:
Yeah, and you bring up a good point, just the reporting on something like Russiagate is one of the reasons why trust in the institution of media is at an all-time low. This is an institution you love. I love the institution of media. What do you make of the fact that it is a crumbling institution, and do you think it’s kind of beyond reach, especially when you add in all the social media aspects to this? Where you are in having hope that people can find a way to just get to the truth?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, people ask me that all the time. Where do I go for reliable news? I’m like, these days, if you want to get a real broad and fair understanding of what’s going on, you should not read one source of news. You should get your news from different places. And I always steer people to aggregate sites that juxtapose different types of stories so you can get an idea of where people are coming from, you can see all viewpoints. I mean, I know there’s accusations now against even the Associated Press, that their stories are not fair anymore, that they’re leaning to the left in some of their coverage. And so people are wondering, “Well, what do I trust? I can’t just turn on the evening news and watch it.” And young people are not turning the TV on at all, and they’re not watching, they’re not clicking on your news site.
So I think there’s a huge lack of trust in the fact that the journalism has become the wild west these days, and for the foreseeable future, it’s the wild west with social media. I think people just get as much information as you can. Never trust one source for anything. Never rely on one source for anything. You have to look at different sites. And when you read a story, are they representing everybody in the story? Are they all getting a fair say? Never trust a story that has sources familiar that you can’t…. When someone’s being accused of something really, really big, and you can’t slightly identify the source, who knows what you’re reading, who knows if it’s true. I mean, it might be. Might not be though. You just don’t know because, not that reporter’s doing something devious, they’re trusting a source who has motives, but they’re not able to pick up those motives. They don’t see it that way.
Beverly Hallberg:
And unfortunately, it sounds like for all of us, and your advice is the same I give to people, it actually is a lot of work that one has to do. You need to read a variety of things and then use critical thinking to try to determine where’s the truth in this. And I would even say, be skeptical of what you read. And I think a lot of people who are busy probably find that discouraging because they’re like, “How do I have time for that?”
Susan Ferrechio:
Right.
Beverly Hallberg:
But I do think that’s the state of where things are in our media. I want to ask you something else just about covering Capitol Hill. I want to talk about some of the relationships behind the scenes. Of course, there are the relationships that you as a reporter have with lawmakers, with the people who work for the lawmakers, sources, et cetera. What about the relationships that we see behind the scenes that some of us would be surprised about? I know we could look at, when it comes to the Supreme Court, you had Ruth Bader Ginsburg who had a wonderful relationship with Justice Scalia. Correct? That is the relationship where they had a really close relationship and they disagreed so often, especially in their later years. Which Senators, which members of Congress that are well-known, would be surprised to know they are actually friends behind the scenes, even though they’re politics are wildly different?
Susan Ferrechio:
Oh, there’s probably less of that these days than there used to be. But that still happens. You know, see committees…. Especially, I think, moreso in the Senate, the people are the chairman and the ranking member and the Senate committees work more closely together. For example, Joe Manchin releases the schedule with the vice chair, with the ranking members, the Republican, and they release things together, like “Here’s what we are working on next week.” You go on the House side, on the Energy Committee, you have to dig around on the webpage to find the minority site. It’s like they don’t exist. So that’s the way it has always been though; the House, it’s always been more unusual to have a non-acrimonious relationship between the chairman and the ranking member of the House. Whereas the Senate, the Senate’s got to get things done because the Senate has a filibuster that forces them to get cooperation on really big important bills. That by nature forces them to work together and changes how people are.
Now, the other interesting relationship I thought was over in the House, was the Appropriations Committee. Two women have been running it for years, and one is retired now, but it was Rosa DeLauro and Kay Granger, Texas. And they had a very congenial relationship. And you saw that with Charlie Rangel and the Republican on Ways and Means for years, they were…. From Louisiana, I can’t remember his name anymore. You’d always see them walking together and talking, having long talks. And that’s always so encouraging to see that because the public, they all want cooperation. They say they do, they want to see Congress working together more and they’re sick of the fighting and all that stuff, or so they say they are. But then the Senate, you see that a lot more because they have to cooperate together. And it certainly doesn’t exist on every committee, but you don’t see…. People are more, they work together in a more friendly way in the Senate, whereas in the House it tends to just be very oppositional just because it’s just a simple majority that runs the place.
Beverly Hallberg:
And it’s a larger body with higher turnover rate. Elections happen more frequently than the Senate. So there’s all of that. I want to ask you about someone specifically on the Senate, somebody who’s been there for a long time, and that is Senator Mitch McConnell. People have lots of opinions about Senator Mitch McConnell. I’m curious of your perspective just from a strategy viewpoint and how he’s operated in the Senate over the years. He knows the rules very well and is always very strategic. In covering him, what has your perspective been of him as a chess player, so to speak?
Susan Ferrechio:
Yeah, for sure. And he definitely is a great chess player in the Senate. I know that there are a few there in the Senate that want somebody who’s a little more of an aggressive leader and they feel like Mitch McConnell plays chess a little too slowly for them. They want something, a little more of an aggressive chess player than Mitch McConnell. And that’s why they forced a leadership election this year. And there were a bunch of people who voted against McConnell, but he came out a big winner. And he’s been away now for a while. He’s supposed to be coming back pretty soon, but he fell, and he was injured, and he was in rehab, and I think he’s coming back. And he is getting up there. All these guys are in their eighties, and there’s always a clamoring for people underneath that it’s time for a turnover, it’s time for change.
Of course, Republicans did not regain the majority as many thought they might with a big red wave in 2022. So that’s going to make him a target for a lot of people who are not content with how things are going. And he also pits himself against President Trump. So President Trump divides the party. Most support him, but certainly not everybody. And Mitch McConnell, of course, came out very robustly against President Trump after his loss in January and the whole situation at the Capitol, and he’s no fan of Trump’s. So that puts him at odds with a lot of Republicans in the party who are basically backing President Trump. And I’m not sure how much longer he’ll be a leader for. He says he is sticking around and running again and all that. And in my view, when leaders are politicians, they get into their eighties, you just don’t know how much longer they’re going to be willing to work for or able to work for. It’s just a fact, a biological fact: you’re getting older.
I don’t have any inside knowledge that he’s planning on leaving. I’m just like, “Oh, the guy’s getting older.” He certainly says he’s staying and he’s coming back, but he does know how to run the floor. He’s been the Republican leader forever, and he knows how to run it in a minority, and he knows how to run it in the majority and how to get things through. And he is definitely one of the masters of that for all the people I’ve covered in the Senate.
Beverly Hallberg:
So speaking of Donald Trump, I am curious what you thought it was like to cover politics when he was president. I know I’m not alone in hearing this constant refrain by those who worked in the media, where we were exhausted all the time feeling like we were drinking out of a firehose because there was so much news and his presence on Twitter created news all the time. How was it like covering him, and did you find yourself exhausted as well?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, I think it was just an obsession with everything he did. And what bothered me so much is I just felt like the press was obsessed with him in an unhealthy way. And I always thought they misinterpreted things that he was saying or, not that I have some secret inside knowledge of interpreting President Trump, but I always felt like they just looked for any way to attack the guy at the press conferences. The media helped create the drama around Trump. They really did. They egged him on, they stirred him into the frenzy that pretty much took over his presidency, the way he behaved. And the media was a big part of that, and they just couldn’t stand the guy from day one. And then of course, Biden comes in, and everyone calms down because it’s like, “Oh, everything’s back to okay now that Trump’s out of office.” That that’s the way the coverage seemed to me.
And Trump was out there constantly. Here we had a president who had his own 24/7 podium that he was operating, and then we’re supposed to write everything he says and does. So naturally you’re like, the news cycle never ends. And then that was what it was like under President Trump, and then on Capitol Hill, it was nothing but efforts to take him down constantly. It was all about how do we impeach him, how do we investigate him, how do we get his taxes, how do we subpoena him? And it was just like a battle, basically. It was a battle between the White House and the Congress for President Trump. And that’s what took over, basically, when I was covering Congress, was just how to get Trump out of office. Basically, that was the goal.
Beverly Hallberg:
Well, final question for you. If we may have some aspiring young journalists listening to this episode, what tips would you give to them? I know you talked about the hustle and working hard, staying late, pounding the pavement or pounding the cement on Capitol Hill, but what other tips would you give to anybody who is aspiring to be a journalist?
Susan Ferrechio:
Well, you have to pick your medium at this point. Do you want to go in the TV? Because TV journalism now, they have an online platform, so you can go work for a television station and you could just be doing online stuff. You’re not even doing on-camera stuff, which is a harder job to secure, obviously. Everyone wants to be on camera, but the writing jobs are there at these television stations. You guys, look for a place and just be willing to do the work. Editors are looking for reporters who are willing to work hard and write well, turn in copy that’s not full of spelling errors or needs to be completely rewritten. Look at…. If you really want to be a journalist, look at other journalists and how they write and what they cover and try to learn a little bit about the style. A lot of people go to journalism school, and they learn to write like this. I did not go to journalism school.
Beverly Hallberg:
Interesting.
Susan Ferrechio:
No, no, I didn’t go. But I used to always look at some of my old mentors at The Associated Press or at other places where I worked, and just try to read how they write things, how do they organize stories, who do they interview? You can learn a lot from fellow journalists, even if you never meet them, just by reading their stories and following how they write things. And you can develop your own style, but there’s a lot to learn. There’s a lot of good journalists out there at every news outlet that you could track and follow, and it’s so easy to do. You can do that with just your computer and learn that way. And then I would say, just be willing to hustle, be willing to start doing any job in a newsroom and work your way up.
I started in Pay Stop. Pay Stop is where you’re not a writer, you’re standing in the newsroom and you’re laying out the paper with wax. That’s how I started my newspaper career, and that’s what I was doing. So I was laying the paper out, taking the things and the ads and pasting them all on a board, and those boards would turn into the newspaper that would land on your doorstep. And that’s what I did. And then I was typing the garden column. I was willing to do anything, just get my foot in the door, and I worked my way up. So you can do that today. You can get into any newsroom and say you’ll do anything. Just work. People like hard workers, and they will give you a chance. They’ll give you a chance as long as you’re willing to…. You’re writing, you’re doing the work and all that stuff and you’re not turning in copy that’s unreadable.
So figure out, are you a writer? Can you write? Do you know how to do it? A lot of people have that sense about themselves that they can write or organize a story. You don’t have to be Ernest Hemingway, but just how do you, or can figure out how to organize a story, how to put a news story together. It’s not rocket science.
Beverly Hallberg:
Yeah.
Susan Ferrechio:
People can learn to do it.
Beverly Hallberg:
Start as Substack. I like to tell people who tell me they want to be a writer, and I say, “Okay, what are you writing?” And sometimes they haven’t written anything. I’m like, “Just start writing. You don’t have to have it published in a specific place.”
Susan Ferrechio:
Right. News is a specific type of thing. If you want to be a journalist, even the Substack writers, some great Substack journalists who are not working for mainstream papers or any papers, and they are putting together phenomenal stuff. Journalism is still…. There is a formula to that, that you follow. And if you want to be a journalist and not just somebody who writes their thoughts or contemplates the world, you have to follow a certain formula for that of how you put together a news story and all that, any news story, a long investigative piece, or it’s all…. There’s things you want to learn how to do, and it’s not that hard to learn. The more you read and read about stuff, you can do it yourself. That’s basically how I learned to be a journalist, by reading other people’s stuff. And I’m sure that’s how everybody else in my field learned as well.
So we need good journalists out there. We need good young journalists who are interested in wanting to get in the field, especially people who aren’t…. People with diverse viewpoints. I think that’s in ways they want to write, young opinion writers, some people are like, “I just want to do opinion.” I think that’s exciting. Young opinion writers who are out there now who are getting a lot of attention. There’s so many ways you can be a journalist these days, and there are a lot of opportunities. Even though the newspapers of the world unfortunately are fewer and fewer, there are a lot of other ways to be a reporter, a lot of other outlets for you to practice journalism.
Beverly Hallberg:
Well, we appreciate that advice. And I also think just a final note to leave people with, for those who are listening and are saying I really want to just get straight news, do follow Susan Ferrechio at The Washington Times. She is an honest reporter, somebody who just tries to get all the details of the story, a quality writer, somebody who has a great network. So I encourage people to check you out. Susan, thank you so much for your time and joining us on She Thinks.
Susan Ferrechio:
Thanks for inviting me, Beverly.
Beverly Hallberg:
And thank you all for joining us. Before you go, Independent Women’s Forum does want you to know that we rely on the generosity of supporters like you. An investment in IWF fuels our efforts to enhance freedom, opportunity, and wellbeing for all Americans. So please consider making a small donation to IWF by visiting iwf.org/donate. That is iwf.org/donate. Last, if you enjoy this episode of She Thinks, do leave us a rating or a review. It does help, and we’d love it if you shared this episode so your friends can know where they can find more She Thinks. From all of us here at IWF, thanks for watching.
