ProPublica and The Texas Tribune announced Thursday that Manny García has been selected as the senior editor of their new investigative reporting initiative. García will help build and manage a team of five reporters and other staffers based in the Tribune’s Austin, Texas, newsroom.
García is currently the ethics and standards editor for the USA Today Network. He was previously the network’s East Region executive editor, overseeing more than 50 newsrooms. García is also the former editor of the Naples Daily News, editor and general manager of Spanish-language El Nuevo Herald and senior news editor of the Miami Herald. García has managed the work of hundreds of reporters, and he was a primary writer and anchor of the Herald’s coverage of the federal raid that removed 6-year-old Elián González from his relatives’ Miami home and returned him to his father in Cuba.
“Manny is the perfect choice to lead our new collaboration with The Texas Tribune,” said Charles Ornstein, a deputy managing editor at ProPublica. “Investigative reporting runs in his blood. He’s a leader, a great mentor and a champion of diverse newsrooms. We’re very excited to welcome him.”
“It is a great honor to join ProPublica and The Texas Tribune,” García said. “Both organizations are known for their public service work, and I could not be prouder to help increase accountability journalism in the Lone Star State. To quote ‘Friday Night Lights’: ‘Clear eyes. Full hearts. Can’t lose.’”
“I’m thrilled,” said Ayan Mittra, the Tribune’s editor. “Manny was the very best of an extraordinary group of applicants for this important job — a superlative editor with a long track record of producing powerful, award-winning investigative journalism. We cannot wait for him to get to Texas.”
As a reporter and editor, García and his teams have won several prizes, including the Pulitzer, Goldsmith and IRE prizes, as well as a national Edward R. Murrow Award. Award-winning projects have exposed sex trafficking in the Caribbean, led to the convictions of numerous public officials, changed Florida law and helped free a man serving a life sentence in prison for murders and a rape he did not commit. He also received the Robert G. McGruder Award for Diversity Leadership.
García serves as a board member for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, the News Leaders Association and the Louisiana State University Manship School of Mass Communication. García served on the IRE board from 2006-2014, including one term as IRE president. He is a graduate of Florida International University and Miami Dade College. Born in Havana, he was raised in Miami.
The Texas initiative will be the second regional publishing venture for ProPublica, an independent, nonprofit investigative reporting organization, which was founded in 2007. The new 11-member investigative reporting unit will be primarily based in the Tribune’s Austin newsroom and begin publishing soon. The initiative is funded by an initial $5.75 million grant from Houston-based Arnold Ventures, with additional support from several other Texas donors. More than $8 million will be invested in the partnership over the next five years.
About ProPublica ProPublica is an independent, nonprofit newsroom that produces investigative journalism in the public interest. With a team of more than 100 dedicated journalists, ProPublica covers a range of topics, focusing on stories with the potential to spur real-world impact. Its local initiatives include ProPublica Illinois, a 12-person newsroom based in Chicago, and the ProPublica Local Reporting Network, which funds and jointly publishes yearlong projects, currently with 20 local news organizations around the country. Since it began publishing in 2008, ProPublica has received five Pulitzer Prizes, five Peabody Awards, three Emmy Awards, seven George Polk Awards and five Online News Association Awards for general excellence.
About Texas Tribune The Texas Tribune is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to engaging and informing Texans on politics, public policy and matters of statewide concern. It is read by nearly 2 million people each month, hosts more than 50 editorial events across Texas each year and operates the nation’s largest statehouse bureau. As part of its mission, the Tribune provides its award-winning journalism to all to republish for free. The Tribune is proud to celebrate a decade of exceptional journalism for an exceptional state.
