Julie Pace named Washington bureau chief

Colleagues, It’s my great pleasure to announce that Julie Pace is our new Washington bureau chief.For the past decade, Julie has anchored our report from the White House, on politics and about Washington. She’s an award-winning reporter and a graceful writer who is an absolute ace on deadline. She’s also a warm and collaborative colleague, who inspires and motivates colleagues with her ambition to win the story every day.
For all those reasons, Julie is the right person to lead this team as the Trump administration rocks the nation and the world. She’ll begin immediately. Throughout the 2016 campaign and into the early days of the Trump administration, the depth of Julie’s reporting and the clarity of her analysis has enriched our report. In her role as bureau chief, Julie will continue to write and report, with a continued focus on the presidency, even as she leads the overall news agenda of the bureau and works closely with reporters to help them do their best work.For that reason, we’re also announcing today a new structure for the bureau’s leadership. Julie’s team will include four deputy bureau chiefs, and we will post those positions internally. Two deputies will focus on newsgathering, working with and overseeing our team of news editors: one on the White House, Congress and politics, and the second overseeing the critical other beats, from national security to education. A third deputy will focus on our visual and digital presentation efforts, including how we present our work in all formats. The fourth deputy will focus on video newsgathering, working closely with Head of U.S. Video and Radio News Denise Vance and her team at the BNC as we transition, later this year and into next year, to a cross-format operation in Washington. Over the past six months, one of the things I’ve heard over and over is that our journalists want more chances to brainstorm, to talk over angles and reporting strategy with their editors and colleagues, to work collaboratively to produce their best work. This change in leadership structure is designed specifically to help meet those needs. Washington is chock full of talent: our aim is to harness that talent to be as competitive as possible on this demanding story. Until the new deputies are in place, I’ve asked White House News Editor Kathleen Hennessey and Assistant Chief of Bureau for Photography David Ake to step forward and help Julie as she transitions into her new role: Kathleen will act on an interim basis in the deputy role vis-a-vis White House, Congress and politics; and David Ake the same on visual/presentation, plus budget issues. Nancy Benac will also be attached to the White House team to assist with editing. To achieve our ambitions, in the next few days, we’ll also post two jobs to boost our coverage of the Russia story and intelligence. These additions to our team will augment the work already underway every day to report on the investigations on the Hill, at the FBI and elsewhere, and discover the facts of the underlying story. In the short term, we’re also going to move additional investigative reporting resources onto the Trump-Russia story to provide more firepower. Brian and I will be in the bureau today to strategize with Julie and her team and answer any questions you might have, and we’re always available on the phone. I want to thank Wendy for her work as acting bureau chief since the start of the year. We’ve all benefited from her steady hand on the story as we moved through the early days of the Trump administration and our own leadership transition. Our commitment to this bureau is strong and intense — and will not waver. We are excited by the challenges ahead, and by the team we’re assembling to attack them. Julie and the entire Washington operation have our full support — and the deepest promise to do everything in our power to win on this story. Best, Sally

The AP news story is available here.