For the first time in the 18 year history of the Nyhan Prize for Political Journalism, the selection committee chose three co-winners for the 2023 Nyhan Prize: Robert Downen, reporter at The Texas Tribune, and the team of Mike Hixenbaugh and Antonia Hylton from NBC News. In a twist of fate and the selection process, all three reporters focused their recent work on the state of Texas, and particularly on the ways that national political debates and movements have influenced local and state politics. 

All three winners joined Denise-Marie Ordway, the Managing Editor of The Journalist’s Resource for a conversation about what it’s like to report from Texas on far-right extremism, white supremacist groups, the evolution of power and the Republican Party, and how public schools and school boards are handling issues of race and gender as they play out on a national stage.

Click here to learn more about all three winners of the 2023 Nyhan Prize for Political Journalism.

The Nyhan Prize for Political Journalism was established at the Shorenstein Center in memory of the late Boston Globe columnist and reporter David Nyhan, who for more than 30 years challenged the powerful and acted as a voice for those whose voices are seldom heard. It honors a political journalist who covers politics and social policy in the public interest and embodies David’s style of journalism that speaks to – and for – everyone. Nyhan was a fellow at the center in 2001, and the prize was established with support from a large group of his family and friends after his death in 2005.