How Do You Cover the Biggest Story of Your Life With No Institution Behind You? with Gillian Brockell

Past Due with Ana Marie Cox and Open Mike Eagle

Ana Marie Cox, Open Mike Eagle, and Andrew Steven

Society & Culture, Arts, Business, Performing Arts

4.6 • 6.4K Ratings

🗓️ 3 June 2026

⏱️ 70 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Journalist Gillian Brockell spent a decade at the Washington Post, took a buyout thinking she'd be back in two years, and watched the place fall apart from the outside. She joins us to talk about what it actually cost to leave, why the buyout money wasn't Bezos being generous, what happened when she filed a major Emmett Till story and the new editors tried to make the bad guy look less bad, and how she ended up becoming what may be the only journalist in America covering ICE deportation flights full time. Hear the bonus conversation at http://patreon.com/pastdue Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Some follow the noise.
0:03.0	Bloomberg follows the money.
0:04.8	Whether it's the funds fueling AI or crypto's trillion dollar swings.
0:09.0	There's a money side to every story.
0:11.4	Get the money side of the story.
0:13.5	Subscribe now at Bloomberg.com.
0:20.4	Attention all passengers.
0:21.6	The Uber ride for Jeff's rugby team will depart in five minutes from Platform 15.
0:27.6	Your ride comes with six toilets and a refreshments carriage that you'll empty within five minutes.
0:34.6	Thank you for booking your tickets on Uber.
0:40.1	Trains on Uber.
0:45.6	What does it look like to walk away from one of the most important newspapers in the world and then watch it change dramatically?
0:48.3	This week we're talking with Gillian Brickle, a former Washington Post staff writer who
0:52.6	ended up becoming the only journalist in America
0:55.2	covering ICE deportation flights full-time.
0:58.5	We get into the real economics of the Washington Post implosion from someone who lived it
1:03.2	and why buyout money isn't usually about somebody being generous.
1:07.7	And what it means to do the most important work of your career with no editor,
1:12.6	no institution, no health insurance, and a spouse's income as your runway.
1:20.1	The creative economy is broken, but some people are still making it work. We're here to find out how.
1:26.1	I'm Anna Marie Cox. And I'm open Mike Eagle. And this is
1:29.5	past due. Welcome to the show, Gillian Brackel from, well, formerly with Washington Post,
	...

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