On Oct. 9, The New Edu hosted a panel discussion with four local politics reporters: Austin Horn of the Lexington Herald-Leader, McKenna Horsley of Kentucky Lantern, Hannah Pinski of The Courier Journal, and Sylvia Goodman of Kentucky Public Radio. The journalists talked about how they promote ethical journalism in their work and the importance of journalism in local communities. The panel gave our cohort of student journalists insight into what a future in the field could look like for them, inspiring the young reporters to cover hard hitting issues and seek truth in their work. The discussion also allowed the adult journalists to highlight some of their work in publications across the state and discuss top political stories ahead of the election. 

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Could you each share your name, the publication you work for, the kind of beat you cover, and a little bit about what drew you to journalism initially?

Hannah: My name is Hannah, and I’m a politics reporter at the Courier Journal, which is based in Louisville. I cover both state politics and Kentucky's federal delegation as well. When I started college, I kind of wanted to work on the PR side of things and work at a nonprofit music organization or orchestra. However, I took one strat comm class my freshman year, and I hated it. I was like, Okay, maybe it's time to give reporting a try. I started off at my college newspaper as an opinions columnist. Eventually, I switched over to the news side and just really loved being able to talk to people, do a lot of storytelling, and write stuff that does have an impact on people's lives. 

Sylvia: My name is Sylvia Goodman. I am the state capitol reporter for Kentucky Public Radio. I cover the state government and how policies play out when they pass, and then also do a little bit of federal delegation, but I try to stay pretty state-centric. I started doing journalism when I was in high school–I went to Manual, and I was in the JNC program. So I started pretty early, and I've really held the course. But I guess it comes down to I like learning a lot. I know that sounds kind of cheesy, but I think everyone who is a journalist can agree: we just like learning about new things and constantly adding to that base of knowledge. 

McKenna: Hi, my name is McKenna Horsley, and I'm a state politics reporter for the Kentucky Lantern. We're a nonprofit outlet, which is really cool, and this is the first nonprofit outlet that I've worked at. I got started in journalism when I was in high school. I went to West Carter High School in Eastern Kentucky, and was part of my student newspaper there. Then, I went to college at the University of Kentucky, and the Kentucky Kernel was a big part of my life through those four years. I think what drew me to journalism, and then specifically political journalism, was just kind of having an interest, in general, in writing, and being curious about things, because you get to learn about so many new topics almost every day, and meet so many new people and hear so many new things. I always had just a huge interest in civics as a teenager, and that kind of translated into this work. 

Austin: I'm also the political reporter at my publication the Herald-Leader. I've been here for almost three years now, which is kind of wild to think about. I think I just vaguely wanted to write in college. I didn't know what that meant or what it would look like, and so the newspaper just kind of made sense. I started with sports, and then moved over to news eventually. I really love it, because it fits that Venn diagram middle of extremely fun, and you also feel like you're doing some kind of public good–or you're doing something that, generally, in theory, makes the world better. That’s just kind of rare to scratch both of those itches. So I really love it. Politics in general is nice because it is a beat, but you can also make of it what you want. Everything is politics in a way, literally every topic under the sun–energy, crime, you can do features that are human interest-y. It's just very versatile, and you never get bored. 

What do you see as the biggest stories coming out of Kentucky, especially considering the election season?

Austin: I'd say the obvious one is Amendment Two. It’s the one that the most money is behind; it's the one that I think there's the most sort of statewide juice behind it, if you will. That's going to be really fascinating to see the final result. I'm going to be really interested to see what that map looks like, what the divide between areas that lean Republican and areas that lean Democrat looks like, what it looks like urban versus rural. That's going to be really fascinating to look through, regardless of how this shakes out, and which coalition sort of wins the day–who makes up that coalition? 

Sylvia: Another thing in a similar vein to Amendment Two, another story I'm going to be watching out for is how all of these cannabis ballot questions go. I think that's going to be a fun one. I don't know if it's going to have some big message about how the state feels in general, but there's a few places around the state where the either local or county government decided to put the ballot question of whether or not they want medical cannabis locations in their county. I think that's just going to say a little bit about how some of these counties–and they tend to be the more conservative, probably a little bit more religious counties–how they feel about this question. Depending on how those votes go, it could produce some momentum, or some real, general indication of how more conservative audiences are feeling about something like cannabis, because obviously we have a lot of lawmakers that feel very strongly one way or the other. I think that's going to be an interesting kind of value statement on the ballot.

McKenna: I was also going to say Amendment Two, so I'll talk about other things, but Amendment Two, I think, is definitely the one to watch. I'm also kind of interested to see if Democrats–because they have a super minority–can make gains in the House and Senate this election cycle, even if it's just a couple of seats. I think it would be interesting to see how that plays out in the long run. So kind of looking beyond just this November, what that means for the Kentucky Democratic Party, if it can become more of a strong minority in the future and have more sway in the legislature. The legislature kind of changes every decade or so, it feels like, in these past few decades. So that would be interesting to see. I'm also looking for the Supreme Court race in central Kentucky. No matter who wins that election, the Supreme Court in Kentucky will have a majority of women on the court for the first time in Kentucky history, which is really interesting. I think there's about 18 states where women are the majority of the court, so Kentucky will join that list no matter who wins that election. 

Hannah: I definitely think the rise of Liberty candidates is interesting and something to watch during this election. Especially during the May primary, there were a couple of Liberty candidates who either beat out incumbents or beat out more well-established Republicans in the state, which is really interesting. Obviously, this will be more long-term, but it'll be interesting to see what kind of perspectives and what priorities they want to bring to the legislature if they get elected, especially since there is not a central definition or characteristics for a Liberty Republican. Each of them kind of either marches to their own drum or has specific beliefs or priorities. I think it'll be really interesting to see how their relationship within the Republican Party works out during the next legislative session.

What steps do you take to try to sustain ethical journalism and integrity in your reporting? 

Sylvia: I know we've had discussions in our newsroom about, how do we better communicate those things to the public? Because I don't think people generally understand how much we sit and constantly think over every single ethical question. It is not simple, and it doesn't matter sometimes how small. Sometimes you end up realizing you talked for an hour about one word, and you're like, let's just cut it. I think that the key answer to that is those discussions. It is having a really solid structure, from the reporter all [the way] to the editor to the newsroom director, and in our case, it goes to a general manager. It's kind of different, depending on the newsroom. So you have an ethical question, all those layers are involved, and everyone can get behind full decisions. It should not come as a shock if someone emails us and they're mad about something. It should have been something we already discussed and we already all agreed on, and we have a reason. Making sure you have that chain of command, but that it's really collaborative at the same time, so that everyone can get behind all the ethical decisions in a newsroom, and that you've really thought through all of the implications of the things you've written, every word choice that you make, every time you decided to reveal someone's identity. Or like today, I don't know if this is ethical or legal, it’s kind of the combination: publishing redacted information, making sure that you fully understand the implications of what you're publishing and how it's going to affect both the public sphere and also individuals.

‍McKenna: For me, it's a lot of free-flowing conversations, not only with my editor, but my colleagues who are reporters as well. So that can look like a conversation that takes place over a matter of days, before something becomes published. It can also just look like a quick Slack message that's like, would you use this word here, or is there a better word that I should be using in this sentence? It's almost like overthinking, but in a really positive way, to make a better product. With every story I do, I'm very active in it. I'm thinking about it a lot. I'm thinking about what different groups of readers might take away from it. It's like an internal conversation with myself, and also with an external conversation with my newsroom.

Hannah: I think as a reporter, one thing I always try to do, especially with lawmakers or politicians or political figures, is always be transparent on what the story is, what you're looking for, and what you have. I think just right off the bat telling them: this is the story I'm working on. This is what I know. This is what we've heard. What is your response to that? I think that goes a long way, both between the source you're talking to, and the reader. Then, just in general, when talking to sources, especially some people who might never have been interviewed before, really making sure they know the differences between on the record versus off the record versus on background. For people who've never been interviewed by a reporter or a news outlet before, they might not be familiar with that, and something they may tell you, they may not want in print necessarily, or on the website. So being clear, so they understand when you're talking to them: this is how the conversation is going to go, this is why I'm hoping to get on the record from you. But if you want to go on background, just laying out what those terms would be and making sure they understand.

Austin: Just to put an exclamation point behind everybody's comments, there's no such thing as over communication with either your source, or in particular, your editor, whenever you have any kind of ethical question. I think it is absolutely worth it to talk to somebody else, because these are the kinds of deep-thinking questions that oftentimes you can't really just your head, like a math problem. There's lots of gray area, and it's totally fine to ask questions. There are no dumb questions. I think another thing that's probably worth mentioning, given that we all work in politics, is that you should be really careful about, if you're covering a political issue, about what you post on social media. There's a moving discussion, or moving target, on objectivity. Is it worth pursuing? Is it even real, can somebody be objective? Does a voice from nowhere exist? I would argue no. But at the same time, if it is your job to cover matters of politics, you really should be careful and think twice and ask people about your own posts. So much is asked of reporters these days. We’re expected to be quippy and have these personas, but it's often really difficult to have that and also be this trusted source of ethical news. I love a good quip. I'm not particularly good at them, but I love them. So like just finding a way to balance that and oftentimes, I would just be on the careful side when you can be.

How do you view the role and responsibility of journalism in our society? 

Sylvia: Obviously I'm biased, because I think we have an invaluable role in society, or else I wouldn't do it, because it's hard. It's fun, but it's also hard and it's stressful. People are always trying to suss out some hidden agenda that you have. When you talk about what is the true core role of ours, I think the goal post has shifted. I was talking about this at a forum the other day. Someone asked a question about misinformation and what our role is in it. Misinformation used to be–and it still is–a lawmaker makes some claim and you fact check it; that was misinformation. Someone publishes something in the newspaper or says something publicly, and you have to fact-check it. Now, some random person on Reddit says something wild, and you have to spend an afternoon trying to prove definitively that it was not true. That is not what it used to be. You didn't have to fact-check absolute random claims, right? That’s what we should do, because politicians believe this stuff; people en masse believe it, and that gives it immense power, so you can't ignore it. At the same time, we have this obligation not to elevate things that are wildly false. I think about all these things all the time–that's like one core job of journalists, just to fact-check what is out in the public sphere. But the kind of twin to that is our goal is also to fill voids of information. We do investigations, we do all this other enterprise work. Alongside that, there are lots of parts of our state where there is just an absolute void of information, and it's not the fault of any individual news outlet. There are some really incredible hyper-local news outlets. These local outlets, these hyper local outlets, can do what statewide reporters simply cannot, and certainly national outlets cannot. At the same time, there's these pockets of the state and of our public life that are just totally uncovered, and we have to do our absolute best to stretch ourselves to cover them. And that doesn't mean we always succeed. I think that's also a really core part of our job, especially in election season: our lawmakers spend their time doing X; you should know that's what they're spending their time doing, whether it's good or bad or neutral, you should know about it. You should know about this race that's happening out in Eastern Kentucky that says a lot about our political climate, but also the people in Eastern Kentucky should know about that race and the people that they might be voting for. So I think that's kind of two of our core roles as it comes specifically to elections. 

McKenna: I think there's a function of journalism that's also very information based. So we're putting out information, we're making sure it's accurate, and, like Sylvia said, we're finding unknown information and bringing that to the public, if there's public interest in that. I think that sounds simple, but it's really not. A lot of work goes into doing that. Then, keeping news organizations afloat is also part of that, in communities where they may not have them, is a tangent of this that I'm really seeing right now, particularly in this election cycle. Even in election cycles in the past, I think one goal that we haven't talked about as much as journalists is the role of media literacy and what that's going to play. I think when we look back on this time in a historical context, that's going to be the big question: how did people not know this? How did people get this misinformation? I think as journalists, it's kind of our duty to not only amplify our own work and show how we did it, but also amplify the work of others. All the people on this panel, I think I've retweeted a story of theirs at some point within this past month. I think it's kind of a part of that information and getting that out to people, but also teaching them how to view if information is accurate for their own sake as well.

‍Hannah: This is going to sound very general, but the very basis is keeping the public informed. What that means sometimes is, for example, during the legislative session, me, McKenna, Austin, Sylvia, we’re there when they're doing committee meetings, when they're gaveling in. The average person who has a different 9-to-5 job can't keep track of what's going on in Frankfort on a day-to-day basis. That's where our role and responsibility comes in: telling them, what do you need to know about what's happening in Frankfort, as an example, and how are their decisions going to impact you? Sometimes that means taking this massive bill that's in language that the average reader is not going to understand, and being able to interpret that and answer the questions of, what would this thing do and how would it most affect you? It's really our job to explain that, and let people know what they need to know, especially for state and local politics. State and local politics have so much more of an impact on the average person than what's going on at the federal level, even if you're watching ABC, MSNBC, all those conversations and drama that's happening– lot of what's going to impact you on a daily basis is what's happening in your state or in your town. 

Austin: It's really hard, especially with our current media environment. We view our work as kind of fitting together with each other as media outlets. I think a lot about: what is the value add of going to an outlet versus following people on social media and just getting your news from there? It’s totally evolving every single week, every single month. It's just changing all the time. I think about my own job in sort of two buckets. One is covering the news, which is like X event happened. Here's what you need to know about it, which is helpful in its own way. You’re also competing with Twitter, X, Facebook, Instagram, all the places where people do get news. It's become harder and harder for me to think about ways to actually be a value add in covering the news. The other bucket that's easier for me to think about and talk about, is providing new information, whether that be through an analytical story, an enterprise story, a feature, an investigation that would not be in the world without your work. That’s not to denigrate the first bucket, because that's necessary, and people do still get that “what happened, who, what, when, where, why,” from news media. But that's just kind of how I sort of split it up, and I'm much more comfortable, given how much social media is kind of taking over people's news consumption, thinking about the future of the second one than the first one. Somebody smarter than me needs to be thinking about the future of that, but the second one, I find it to be a more comfortable niche to try and pursue, because you're not competing as much with all these other things that are working to get people's eyeballs and attention.

What is some advice that you would give to a young journalist interested in pursuing this career? 

Hannah: I think my biggest advice, especially when you first are in the field is, you have to be confident. If you're not, fake it till you make it, and you eventually do become confident. I was in DC before I came to Louisville. I was [working at] Politico during the internship, and was on the transportation team on Capitol Hill almost every single day. When I first got there, it was very nerve-wracking to be surrounded by The New York Times, The Washington Post, all these huge reporters, and we're all trying to chase down the same people and trying to get 20 those 20 seconds to talk to them, and competing with each other. You just have to be confident in going up to–whether it's a lawmaker, a politician–[and] asking those hard questions. Even if you aren't totally confident at first, because I definitely wasn't, you build up your stamina, convince yourself you've got this, and practice questions, knowing what you're going to ask ahead of time. 

McKenna: My first piece of advice would be to become a student journalist as early as possible. If your school offers something like a newspaper or some kind of outlet like that, go for it. If they don't, start one, and try to go about it that route. If you're in j-school, definitely get involved with student publications when you go to college, and that way, you kind of have the feel of working in a newsroom before you're in a professional newsroom. I think that that helped me personally, [to] kind of go through my growing period early. I was able to fine tune how to write a story, how to interview somebody, before I was out in an internship or at a job. One thing that I wish I knew was more about nonprofit journalism. When I graduated from college in 2019, I didn't apply to any nonprofit jobs. I've mostly stuck with traditional newspapers, because that was where more of my connections were, but honestly, I just didn't know how many were out there. Just become familiar with those places and look there for not only jobs in the future, but internships, fellowships, and other opportunities as well.

Austin: I've got two things that come to mind. The first one is to be nice. I think a lot of people have this idea, particularly in political and investigative journalism, that you have to be the dogged newsman of the 1960s and you have to wear your little cap in the right way, and ask the hardest questions possible, and be the super aggressive person. I think there's room in journalism for all types of people, but in general, the nicer you are, it just makes your job a lot easier. And you tend to grow the kind of source network that becomes really valuable to you. That doesn't mean you have to go out of your way to praise a political figure–because you certainly should not do that. But just be a nice person. You catch more flies with honey than vinegar, etc, etc. The other one that I would have is to go local, if you can, especially starting out .I started my journalism career out in DC. I worked at NPR, and it was pretty good. I switched to work at the very small Frankfort State Journal, and it was an awesome job. It was so cool. You get to really wrap your head around a community and how everything works in a concrete, real-life way.

Sylvia: I was going say–stay local. I think that there's just his automatic thing [to] want to start at a newsroom that has the highest possible circulation. You can start out at even some of the more mid-sized, not national outlets. [There] you will either get the really small stories that the more senior reporters don't want, or you get little pieces of other stories. If you really want the chance to work on stories that have real impacts and real meaning to you, and you want an editor who really has the time to sit and listen to you, start at your local paper or any local paper in the country. My other piece of advice, along with being nice and being confident, to pair with those is: don't be afraid to say, boldly: what is a fact? Say it as it is. Say the truth. If a politician says something that's a blatant lie, next sentence, blatant lie. That is what our job is, and you can still do it in a way that tomorrow, I can go to Frankfort and I can talk to that lawmaker and be respectful and polite and still ask them for a quote. You can do all of these things, and they can exist in tandem, with full honesty and full discretion. I think we can all agree, hopefully in this room, that you can say things that are the objective truth and not be partisan about it, even if you're talking about a partisan subject. So just just be bold. Be confident, like Hannah was saying, in asserting what is truthful and what is a fact. That’s a conversation with your editor sometimes, but don't be shy; be bold when it comes to the truth.

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