David Barstow

David Barstow (BSJ86) was inducted into the Medill Hall of Achievement in 2015. He is a senior writer at The New York Times. He was the first journalist in history to receive four Pulitzer Prizes in reporting categories.

Barstow, along with colleagues from The New York Times, received the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting for a series of investigative pieces in The New York Times detailing President Donald Trump’s personal finances. The series detailed “dubious tax schemes” and outlined the millions the president inherited from his father

He was awarded the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting, along with Alejandra Xanic von Bertrab, for their stories on Wal-Mart using bribery to dominate the market in Mexico. He also was awarded the Pulitzer for Investigative Reporting in 2009 for "Message Machine," his series about the Pentagon's hidden campaign to influence news coverage of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2004, The New York Times was awarded in the Public Service category for the work of Barstow and Times colleague Lowell Bergman that examined the death and injury of American workers due to workplace safety violations by their employers.

In addition, Barstow’s investigations have won four George Polk Awards, a Goldsmith Prize, an Alfred I. duPont Silver Baton, a Peabody Award, a Loeb Award, an IRE Award and an Overseas Press Club Citation, among many other awards. He was also a Pulitzer finalist while a reporter for The St. Petersburg Times in Florida.

Barstow joined The New York Times in 1999 as a reporter on the Metro Desk and joined the newspaper’s investigative unit in 2002. He is currently head of the Investigative Reporting Program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism.