Press Release | The Sidney Hillman Foundation
James DeHaven, Howard Stutz, and Jennifer Robison with the Las Vegas Review-Journal win the January Sidney Award for unmasking GOP powerbroker Sheldon Adelson’s secret acquisition of their newspaper.
Adelson’s furtiveness is puzzling in an era when billionaires buy media properties as openly and casually as they buy yachts, but the Sidney winners’ coverage might help explain it.
A month before Adelson was unmasked, three Review-Journal reporters were mysteriously ordered to drop everything and monitor three Clark County judges for two weeks. The team reported that one of those judges is hearing a wrongful termination suit against Adelson.
Soon after the sale, the paper’s manager wrote that reporters should not worry about the new owner’s identity and advised them instead to focus on doing their jobs—a statement that was later expunged from the story.
“The team was brave to forge ahead, against the owner’s wishes,” said Sidney judge Lindsay Beyerstein, “Their coverage is a coup for transparency, accountability, and journalistic independence.”
The fallout from the acquisition and the subsequent exposé is still being felt at Nevada’s largest newspaper. Editor Mike Hengel resigned on December 22.
“Mike’s leadership, along with the support and guidance of deputy editor Jim Wright, helped make our reporting on this story possible,” Jennifer Robison told The Backstory.
The paper has since adopted a new set of guidelines for covering the Adelson family and their interests in the paper and the state.
James DeHaven covers state government for the Helena Independent Record. He reported from two city halls in his nearly three years at the Las Vegas Review-Journal, covering Nevada's first and fourth-largest cities.
Business reporter Howard Stutz has covered the gaming industry on a local, state, national and international level for 11 years. He writes a twice-a-week column on the gaming industry for the Review-Journal.
Jennifer Robison has worked as a business journalist in Las Vegas for more than 15 years. She has reported for the Review-Journal since 2005.
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The Sidney Hillman Foundation honors excellence in journalism in service of the common good. Judges are Ta-Nehisi Coates (on leave), Jelani Cobb, Alix Freedman, Hendrik Hertzberg, Katrina vanden Heuvel, Harold Meyerson, and Lindsay Beyerstein. The Sidney Award is given monthly to acknowledge an outstanding piece of journalism during that month.
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