Before becoming the host of our upcoming podcast, I was a reporter with ProPublica’s Midwest team covering Minnesota, my home state. I wrote about issues affecting vulnerable populations with a special interest in child welfare, criminal justice and housing. My reporting has changed state housing laws and touched off enforcement actions by the Minnesota attorney general.

Before coming to ProPublica, I was a senior staff writer for BBC North America and a fellow at the radio program “This American Life.” I hosted a BBC podcast called “Bad Cops,” based on my reporting about a rogue plainclothes police unit in Baltimore. My early career took place at a string of alternative newsweeklies, including City Pages in Minneapolis and the Riverfront Times in St. Louis. One of my proudest accomplishments from this time was a story that ultimately freed a Missouri man from prison. Other previous work won an Asian American Journalists Association Excellence Award and a National Native Media Award.