Brady Walkinshaw leaves politics to take on the Grist of journalism - seattlepi.com
Updated 10:38 pm, Tuesday, March 7, 2017
Ex-State Rep. Brady Walkinshaw, who lost a bid for Congress in November, becomes CEO of the environmenal news organization Grist.
Ex-State Rep. Brady Walkinshaw, who lost a bid for Congress in November, becomes CEO of the environmenal news organization Grist.
Photo: GRANT HINDSLEY, SEATTLEPI.COM
Journalism has captured one of the top young political talents of Washington state, as ex-State Rep. Brady Pinero Walkinshaw has taken the job as CEO of Grist, a high-profile national environmental news organization.
.He anticipates it will be a "multi-year commitment," said Walkinshaw, a productive state legislator who lost his bid for Congress in November to U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal.
Grist needs him in what the news site describes as "a dark time" for environmentalists. The site itself needs to retool its often-snarky, often-self-important writing style, and better connect with the Pacific Northwest where it is produced.
Walkinshaw made control of carbon emissions a central theme of his campaign for Congress. He is a product of Princeton, but was raised in the rural Whatcom County town of Custer north of Bellingham.
Walkinshaw is a former program manager at the Gates Foundation, and in private life married to Micah Horwith, a marine biologist.
Grist is changing as Walkinshaw comes aboard. Chip Giller, who founded Grist in 1999, will take on a new role, described in effusive language as launching "a platform to elevate and connect riding green innovators and influencers -- the activists, artists, technologists, politicians and storytellers charting a path toward a more just and sustainable future."
Grist is also expanding its coverage of environmental justice, having hired a new senior editor, Nikhil Swaminathan. It is promising more in-depth reporting, special projects and "surprising storytelling methods."
"At Grist, we envision a planet that doesn't burn and a future that doesn't suck," said Giller. "The new administration wants to build a wall, a wall against hope. Grist will show that there are solutions that can take humanity over, under around -- and, ultimately through -- the wall to a sustainable workld that works for everyone.
"Brady is the perfect person to lead our next chapter."
The environmental movement has been slow to respond to the Trump administration, and slow to return to the grassroots activist that launched it on Earth Day nearly 47 years ago.
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