2026 Pulitzer Prizes
Journalism
The Washington Post
For piercing the veil of secrecy around the Trump administration's chaotic overhaul of federal agencies and chronicling in rich detail the human impacts of the cuts and the consequences for the country.
Finalists:
Staff of The Minnesota Star Tribune
For its coverage of a shooting at a back-to-school Mass at a Catholic school that left two children dead and 28 wounded, powerful stories marked by thoroughness and compassion.
Finalists:
Staff of The New York Times
For deeply reported stories that exposed how President Trump has shattered constraints on conflicts of interest and exploited the moneymaking opportunities that come with power, enriching his family and allies.
Finalists:
Jeff Horwitz and Engen Tham of Reuters
For inventive and revelatory reporting on Meta that detailed the technology company’s willingness to expose users, including children, to scams and AI manipulation.
Finalists:
Aaron Parsley of Texas Monthly
For his extraordinary personal account of survival and loss written days after the historic Central Texas floods that tore the writer’s house out from under him and his family, taking the life of his nephew.
Finalists:
M. Gessen of The New York Times
For an illuminating collection of reported essays on rising authoritarian regimes that draw on history and personal experience to probe timely themes of oppression, belonging and exile.
Finalists:
Jahi Chikwendiu of The Washington Post
For a heart-wrenching and achingly beautiful photo essay on a young family welcoming the birth of their first child as the father is slowly dying from cancer.
Finalists:
Staff of Pablo Torre Finds Out
For a pioneering and entertaining form of live podcast journalism that investigated how the Los Angeles Clippers seemingly evaded the NBA’s salary cap rules by funneling money to a star player through an environmental startup.
Finalists:
Books, Drama & Music
Angel Down, by Daniel Kraus (Atria Books)
A breathless novel of World War I, a stylistic tour-de-force that blends such genres as allegory, magical realism and science fiction into a cohesive whole, told in a single sentence.
Finalists:
Liberation, by Bess Wohl
A striking blend of comedy and sincerity that explores the legacy of the consciousness-raising feminist groups of the 1970s, using the story of the playwright’s mother to demonstrate how the movement grew out of conversation, and that anyone experiencing the play has joined the discussion.
Finalists:
Picaflor: A Future Myth, by Gabriela Lena Frank (G. Schirmer, Inc.)
Premiered on March 13, 2025 at Marian Anderson Hall, Philadelphia, a modern symphonic work informed by the composer’s personal experiences with California wildfires and Andean legend, ten powerful movements that follow a hummingbird through its attempts to escape cataclysms, a contemplation of the fragile future.
Finalists:
Special Citations
Julie K. Brown
A special citation is awarded to Miami Herald reporter Julie K. Brown for her groundbreaking reporting in 2017 and 2018 that exposed Jeffrey Epstein’s systematic abuse of young women, the justice system that protected him, and, over time, his powerful network of associates and enablers. Her Perversion of Justice series, published nearly a decade ago, revealed how prosecutors shielded Epstein from federal sex trafficking charges when he was first accused of abusing young women. She went on to document and give voice to the scores of victims who had been groomed and abused by him and others in his circle. Her work, and the release of the government’s Epstein files, continue to reverberate around the world.