The Best of ProPublica
20+ most popular ProPublica articles, as voted by our community.
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New this Week
These are fresh off the press.
Inside UnitedHealth’s Effort to Deny Coverage for a Patient’s Care
After a college student finally found a treatment that worked, the insurance giant decided it wouldn’t pay for the costly drugs. His fight to get coverage exposed the insurer’s hidden procedures for…
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Google’s Quest to Digitize Valuable Military Tissue Samples
The tech giant has long sought access to a priceless trove of veterans’ skin samples, tumor biopsies and slices of organs. DOD staffers have pushed back, raising ethical and legal concerns, but Google…
ProPublica on Education
The Corporation Exploiting Washington’s Special Education System
Universal Health Services collected more than $38 million in tax dollars for special education services that families and former teachers say it largely didn’t provide
America’s Adult Education System Is Broken. Here’s How Experts Say We Can Fix It.
Experts say that more money is critical to improving the national system. Many states have developed creative solutions in spite of their limited funding.
ProPublica on Equity
Black Children Were Jailed for a Crime That Doesn’t Exist. Almost Nothing Happened to the Adults in…
Judge Donna Scott Davenport oversees a juvenile justice system in Rutherford County, Tennessee, with a staggering history of jailing children. She said kids must face consequences, which rarely seem…
Why We Are Publishing the Tax Secrets of the .001%
We are disclosing the tax details of the richest Americans because we believe the public interest in an informed debate outweighs privacy considerations.
ProPublica on Finance
When Private Equity Becomes Your Landlord
Amid a national housing crisis, giant private equity firms have been buying up apartment buildings en masse to squeeze them for profit, with the help of government-backed Freddie Mac. Meanwhile,…
America’s Highest Earners And Their Taxes Revealed
Secret IRS files reveal the top US income-earners and how their tax rates vary more than their incomes. Tech titans, hedge fund managers and heirs dominate the list, while the likes of Taylor Swift…
ProPublica on Google Ads
Inside Google’s Ad Display Network Black Box: Porn, Piracy, Fraud
Google’s ad business hides nearly all publishers it works with and where billions of ad dollars flow. We uncovered a network containing manga piracy, porn, fraud and disinformation.
ProPublica on Immigration
Google Says Google Translate Can’t Replace Human Translators. Immigration Officials Have Used It to Vet Refugees.
Documents shared with ProPublica show that immigration officials have been told to vet refugees’ social media posts using Google Translate. Language experts caution even students against using the…
ProPublica on Justice
Never-Before-Seen Trump Tax Documents Show Major Inconsistencies
The president’s businesses made themselves appear more profitable to lenders and less profitable to tax officials. One expert calls the differing numbers “versions of fraud.”
When Medical Debt Collectors Decide Who Gets Arrested
Welcome to Coffeyville, Kansas, where the judge has no law degree, debt collectors get a cut of the bail, and Americans are watching their lives — and liberty — disappear in the pursuit of medical…
ProPublica on Race
Facebook Lets Advertisers Exclude Users by Race
Facebook’s system allows advertisers to exclude black, Hispanic, and other “ethnic affinities” from seeing ads.
ProPublica on Wealth
When You’re a Billionaire, Your Hobbies Can Slash Your Tax Bill
Thoroughbred horses, auto racing, massive ranches, luxury hotels. The hobbies and side businesses of the ultrawealthy create huge write-offs that can let them get away with paying little or no income…
Popular
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The Secret IRS Files: Trove of Never-Before-Seen Records Reveal How the Wealthiest Avoid Income Tax
ProPublica has obtained a vast cache of IRS information showing how billionaires like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Warren Buffett pay little in income tax compared to their massive wealth — sometimes,…
«The data provides an unprecedented look inside the financial lives of America’s titans, including Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Rupert Murdoch and Mark Zuckerberg.»
The Climate Crisis Is Worse Than You Can Imagine. Here’s What Happens If You Try.
A climate scientist spent years trying to get people to pay attention to the disaster ahead. His wife is exhausted. His older son thinks there’s no future. And nobody but him will use the outdoor…
How Polio Crept Back Into the U.S.
U.S. public health agencies generally don’t test wastewater for signs of polio. That may have given the virus time to circulate silently before it paralyzed a New York man.
White Parents Rallied to Chase a Black Educator Out of Town. Then, They Followed Her to the…
Cecelia Lewis was asked to apply for a Georgia school district’s first-ever administrator job devoted to diversity, equity and inclusion. A group of parents — coached by local and national anti-CRT…
Inside the Fall of the CDC
How the world’s greatest public health organization was brought to its knees by a virus, the president and the capitulation of its own leaders, causing damage that could last much longer than the…
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