Mission Statement

TPM is a thinking person’s tabloid, a digital publication in the tradition of the great metro tabloids of the 20th century. Pairing these two words together may seem like a contradiction. But it is the premise of our publication that when political journalism is done right for an audience of committed and interested political news junkies there is no need to choose between what is smart and serious-minded and what is punchy, colorful and irresistible to read. We strive for a tone that is serious without being earnest and maintain a posture of skepticism and an eye for the humor and irony in everything we cover. Emma Goldman famously said, “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.” We take the same attitude toward covering the news.

What makes this possible is a team of journalists who are interested in and concerned with the substance of the issues we cover, not just the optics or who wins the day. We make no claim to impartiality or balance in our coverage. What we commit to is fairness, accuracy and fundamental honesty with readers.

The stories that most interest us – the TPM stories we’re known for – turn on corruption in public life, struggles over core public policy issues, betrayals of public trust, extremism, scandal and stupidity in public life. We strive to tell these stories with an eye for the telling detail, the surreal, the genuine, the comical and the ugly.

Our existence as a publication is based on earning and maintaining the trust and dedication of our audience. To accomplish this, we must constantly sift through the news looking for these TPM stories and then follow them doggedly until there’s nothing left to cover. We must be dedicated to breaking news on and advancing these key stories every day. We must finally provide analysis and perspective which is based on a deep engagement and concern with the issues we cover. These are brand promises we strive to make good on every day to remain a must-read publication for these target readers who not only know that the news is important but love reading it in all its colorful, sometimes ugly and often comical dimensions.

Key to our strategy and identity as a publication is remaining close to and in steady communication with our readers. Journalism is filled with conventions and formats that separate reporters from their readers. Source confidences and confirmation are of course critical. But within the confines of core journalistic principles, our goal should always be to leave as little gap as possible between what we know as reporters and editors and what our readers can learn from reading what we publish. Our core strategy is iterative journalism, an approach that brings new information to readers as it develops and remains as agnostic as possible to the conventions of journalistic writing. Simply put, the story and the nature of the information should dictate our approach to writing it.

Closeness to readers also encourages feedback. That helps us be a better publication and encourages tips which help us break more news. Much of what is now called news crowdsourcing was advanced or even created by TPM. Strategies we helped pioneer are now ubiquitous. We must recommit to these roots and take them further.

We want team members who are ambitious, smart and dogged in their approach to covering the news. We want you to be a star in our profession and we want TPM to be part of making you one. It is a core priority of our company to provide you with compensation, benefits and work experience which match the doggedness and dedication which are critical to fulfilling our mission.