The Spokesman-Review

Since 2020, I've covered the impact of federal politics and policy on Spokane and the Inland Northwest for The Spokesman-Review. You can find all my reporting for the paper here, and here are some highlights:

• ​I've covered the impact of a faulty computer system the Department of Veterans Affairs has tested in the Inland Northwest since 2020, including harmful delays in care, an exodus of demoralized health care providers and serious budget and staffing problems. This reporting earned the National Press Foundation's "Feddie" Award for coverage of the federal government in 2022.
• I reported on the impact of the Trump administration's sweeping cuts to the federal workforce in 2025, including the firing of VA employees who play critical roles in hospital operations and the closure of a workplace safety office in Spokane.
• I wrote about the Trump's administration's cuts to USAID, public broadcasting and Arabic-langugage media.
• I've covered major Supreme Court cases that involve the Northwest, including challenges to Idaho's near-total ban on abortion and the Indian Child Welfare Act.
• I interviewed Idaho's two Republican senators as the start of the second Trump administration brought them more influence than ever: Sen. Mike Crapo as a chief architect of GOP tax policy and Sen. Jim Risch as a leading voice on foreign policy.
• In 2023, I traveled with Risch to an international security conference in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and wrote an in-depth profile of the third Idahoan to lead the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
• I reported from the 2024 Republican and Democratic conventions in Milwaukee and Chicago.
• I covered the final years of Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers' career in Congress, as the Republican from Eastern Washington ascended to lead the Energy and Commerce Committee, helping Mike Johnson become House speaker and spearheading an ultimately futile effort to pass data privacy legislation.
• I covered the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, how Northwest Republicans responded to the riot and Trump's impeachment for inciting it.
• I reported on a wild 2022 race in Washington's most conservative congressional district, where Dan Newhouse ended up being the only House Republican to survive a Trump-backed challenge after voting to impeach the former president for inciting the Capitol riot.
• I returned to the campaign trail in Central Washington in 2024, when Newhouse narrowly survived again despite finishing second in the primary behind another Republican.
• I reported from the Spokane Tribe's annual Labor Day powwow in 2023, as a new generation of leaders helped the century-old event recover after wildfires and the pandemic reduced attendance.
• I've written about Congress repeatedly failing to pass immigration reform for farmworkers despite the support of Northwest Republicans, leading to uncertainty about the Trump administration's policy toward unauthorized immigrant farmworkers in 2025.
• I covered the Sinixt people's landmark victory in the Supreme Court of Canada, which recognized the Sinixt as a First Nation decades after Canada's government declared them "extinct."
• I covered Northwest contestants – and the surprising role the Sinixt played – in the National Spelling Bee in 2022 and 2023.
• In the days after Jan. 6, 2021, my colleague Emma Epperly and I broke the news that Trump was blocking aid to wildfire victims in Washington state over his beef with Gov. Jay Inslee.
• During the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021, I interviewed the former U.S. ambassador to the country, Ryan Crocker, who sharply criticized the Biden administration's handling of the crisis. In the months before the withdrawal, I wrote about the war's lasting impact on people in Spokane, including the local Afghan community.
• I wrote about a bipartisan effort to pass a federal data privacy law  which died amid opposition from a powerful Washington senator.
• In August 2020, I broke the news that the U.S. Postal Service had warned state voting officials that mail-in ballots wouldn't be delivered in time to be counted in some states.
• I rode the train from D.C. to Spokane as Amtrak restarted daily long-distance service during the pandemic and wrote about the passenger railway as it marked its 50th anniversary and Biden promised a historic funding boost.
• I covered Rep. Mike Simpson's plan for breaching the Lower Snake River dams in an effort to restore salmon runs, which shook up the region's long-running fight over the harm and benefits of hydroelectric dams.
• I wrote about what a minimum wage means along the border between Idaho, which has the nation's lowest minimum wage, and Washington, where the wage is twice as high.
• I wrote about the conundrum Idaho Democrats face in a state dominated by two factions of Republicans.

The Washington Post

As a grad student at American University, I worked with The Post's investigative team and reported on the general assignment desk. Here are some highlights:

• I reported from Minnesota and Maryland on a decision by the Trump administration that threatened Liberian refugees with deportation after decades living in the U.S. lawfully. Days before it was set to expire, the Trump administration extended the program for another year, and Congress later passed a provision giving permanent resident status to Liberian DED holders as part of the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act.
• I covered the 2019 Scripps National Spelling Bee, and looked into why the contest saw an unprecedented eight co-champions.
• I profiled a trio of street vendors who capitalized on the traffic at one of DC's most notorious intersections.
• I covered DC's first (legal) goat yoga session, which took place in a cemetery, of course. I also shot photos for this story, because people doing yoga with baby goats evidently wasn't a big priority for the "democracy dies in darkness" guys.
• I contributed reporting to a story on cold case homicide investigations, part of The Post's "Murder with Impunity" series, a finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in explanatory reporting.
• I also contributed to The Post's coverage of the 2019 Virginia Beach shooting and the 2018 midterm election in Maryland.
• I interviewed Brad "Scarface" Jordan on his run for Houston city council, lent nuance to a viral story on an especially high-stakes divorce, and looked into a controversial effort to turn San Francisco's homelessness problem around, among a bunch of other general assignment stories.

Misc.

• Plastic Wars, PBS Frontline and NPR, aired March 31, 2020 — I helped report, produce and edit this documentary as an Investigative Reporting Workshop fellow.
• Federal Grants 'A Lifesaver’ In Opioid Fight, But States Still Struggle To Curb Meth, Kaiser Health News/NPR, June 17, 2019 — I co-reported this story on the limitations of grants meant to combat the opioid crisis, an idea that came out of an analysis of federal spending data I did for a class at American University.
• Months after introduction, a D.C. bill on homeless discrimination hasn't had a hearing, Street Sense Media, April 4, 2018 — An early attempt at reporting, written when I was volunteering at Street Sense before my bartending shifts.
• Activists mourn steady pace of homeless deaths in the nation’s capital, Street Sense Media, Dec. 22, 2017
• Returning citizens share their struggles and successes in support of new legislation, Street Sense Media, Nov. 16, 2017
• How the West Lost Burundi, Foreign Policy, Aug. 28, 2015
• Poverty and unemployment fuel Burundi’s unrest, Equal Times, May 7, 2015

© 2025 Orion Donovan Smith