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Charles Ornstein

Charles Ornstein is managing editor, local, overseeing ProPublica’s local initiatives. These include offices in the Midwest, South, Southwest and Northwest, a joint initiative with the Texas Tribune, and the Local Reporting Network, which works with local news organizations to produce accountability journalism on issues of importance to their communities.

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Charles Ornstein is managing editor, local, overseeing ProPublica’s local initiatives. These include offices in the Midwest, South, Southwest and Northwest, a joint initiative with the Texas Tribune, and the Local Reporting Network, which works with local news organizations to produce accountability journalism on issues of importance to their communities. From 2008 to 2017, he was a senior reporter covering health care and the pharmaceutical industry. He then worked as a senior editor and deputy managing editor.

Prior to joining ProPublica, he was a member of the metro investigative projects team at the Los Angeles Times. In 2004, he and Tracy Weber were lead authors on a series on Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center, a troubled hospital in South Los Angeles. The articles won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for public service, the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, and the Sigma Delta Chi Award for Public Service.

In 2009, he and Weber worked on a series of stories that detailed serious failures in oversight by the California Board of Registered Nursing and nursing boards around the country. The work was a finalist for the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for public service.

Projects edited or co-edited by Ornstein have won the Pulitzer Prize for public service, the Selden Ring Award for Investigative Reporting, the Scripps Howard Impact Award, the IRE Award, the Online Journalism Award and other major journalism honors.

He previously worked at the Dallas Morning News, where he covered health care on the business desk and worked in the Washington bureau. Ornstein is a past president of the Association of Health Care Journalists and an adjunct journalism professor at Columbia University. Ornstein is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.

We Fact-Checked Lawmakers’ Letters to Constituents on Health Care

They’re full of lies and misinformation.

Fact-Checking Elected Officials on the Affordable Care Act Repeal

ProPublica is working with other news organizations to collect and analyze letters and emails from elected officials to constituents on the ACA, beginning with a misleading missive by Missouri Sen. Roy Blunt. Send us more!

The Prescribers

How a Simple Fix to Reduce Aberrant Prescribing Became Not So Simple

In 2014, the government said health providers would have to enroll in Medicare in order to prescribe drugs to seniors and disabled beneficiaries. Delay after delay has pushed back the requirement until 2019. It’s been “much more challenging” than anticipated, an official concedes.

The Travel Ban

After Officials Sign Off, Cleveland Clinic Doctor Secretly Returns Home

Suha Abushamma had been forced to leave the United States after President Donald Trump’s travel ban. She sued, and high-level discussions led to her return yesterday.

The Travel Ban

Despite Judge’s Order, a Cleveland Clinic Doctor Still Can’t Come Back to U.S.

A federal judge’s order has allowed many people with visas to come to the U.S. But Dr. Suha Abushamma isn’t one of them. She was forced to give up her visa. And now she’s suing.

The Travel Ban

Cleveland Clinic Medical Trainee Sues to Come Back to U.S.

Dr. Suha Abushamma was denied entry to this country Saturday, hours after President Trump signed an executive order temporarily banning visitors from seven countries.

The Travel Ban

Trump’s Travel Ban is Wreaking Havoc on Families, Especially Those With Valid Visas

The executive order banning travel from seven predominantly Muslim nations is separating families who made every effort to follow U.S. immigration law.

The Travel Ban

Trump’s Executive Order Strands Brooklyn Doctor in Sudan

A second-year resident at Interfaith Medical Center in Brooklyn was blocked when he tried to board a flight back from Sudan. Now, he worries what will happen to his patients.

The Travel Ban

Hours After Landing in U.S., Cleveland Clinic Doctor Forced to Leave by Trump’s Order

Dr. Suha Abushamma’s flight back to Saudi Arabia took off minutes before a federal judge ordered such forced removals to stop. “She was basically racing against Trump,” a colleague and friend said.

The Breakthrough: Uncovering Danger at the Pharmacy Counter