RNA

After a year of vacancy at the top of the editorial team, the National Catholic Reporterthe 60-year-old left-leaning Catholic media company, announced that James V Grimaldi, a senior editor at The Wall Street Journalwas appointed editor-in-chief.

Grimaldi, 62, is scheduled to start on Sept. 16, filling a position that has been vacant since August 2023, when Heidi Schlumpf resigned after four years in the role and became senior correspondent. Grimaldi will report directly to Joe Ferullo, the newspaper’s CEO and publisher.

James Grimaldi. IMAGE: Courtesy of NCR,

In an arrangement that keeps pace with the technology-enabled restructuring of modern journalism, Grimaldi will run the editorial board of NCR, which is headquartered in Kansas City, from Washington, where the newspaper has offices in the historic Methodist Building on Capitol Hill. Ferullo, a retired television executive, will work from Los Angeles.

Ferullo said in a statement about Grimaldi’s appointment: “James is committed to NCR’s mission; he will elevate and expand NCR’s outstanding journalism at a pivotal moment in the history of the Catholic Church. All of us at NCR – including our readers – look forward to his exceptional editorial leadership at this exciting and pivotal time,” Ferullo said.

In a long career that began at the San Diego TribuneGrimaldi has become known for his accountability and investigative reporting. In more than two decades of covering politics and government affairs for The Washington Post and Journal, he reported on corruption among federal judges and government officials.

Grimaldi has won three Pulitzer Prizes for his investigative work. In 1996, he contributed to a Pulitzer Prize for the Orange County Register by reporting on unethical fertility practices at a research university. In 2006, he and two colleagues won a Pulitzer for an investigation into the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal. In 2023, during his time at the magazineHe won another lawsuit because he uncovered conflicts of interest involving several federal employees.

With 40 employees, NCR attracts a million readers to its website each month and publishes 26 print issues each year. Catholics’ opportunities to read about their faith and its institutions have shrunk in recent years. Diocesan newspapers, once considered important guides to the thinking of local bishops and the national church, have disappeared in many places. At the end of 2022, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops ceased domestic operations of its Catholic News Service, which now maintains only its Vatican office.

NCR is a supporter of Pope Francis and, under Schlumpf, was known for criticizing U.S. Catholic bishops for decisions the paper’s editors viewed as politically motivated, such as denying communion to pro-abortion Democratic politicians.

Beginning in the 1980s, the newspaper played a crucial role in the Catholic Church’s confrontation with the sex abuse scandal, reporting not only on abusive priests but also on the US bishops’ cover-up in June 1985. The news medium also reported on the mismanagement of diocesan funds and the impact of conservative donors on the US church.