When Anna Wolfe won the Pulitzer Prize for her dogged reporting on Mississippi’s welfare fraud scandal, she had no inkling she was soon going to h

She won a Pulitzer for exposing how the country's poorest state spent federal welfare money. Now she might go to jail.

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2024-07-09 20:00:07

When Anna Wolfe won the Pulitzer Prize for her dogged reporting on Mississippi’s welfare fraud scandal, she had no inkling she was soon going to have to contend with the possibility of going to jail.

But just over a year after she secured journalism’s top award for exposing how $77 million in federal welfare funds went to athletes, cronies and pet projects, she and her editor, Adam Ganucheau, are contemplating what to pack for an extended stay behind bars. Sued for defamation by the state’s former governor — a top subject of their reporting — they have been hit with a court order requiring them to turn over internal files including the names of confidential sources. They say the order is a threat to journalism that they will resist.

“If one of us goes to jail, we will be the first person to go to jail in the Mississippi welfare scandal,” Wolfe told NBC News, referring to the eight indictments that stemmed from the imbroglio, none of which has yet resulted in a sentence. “How can I make promises to sources that I’m going to keep them confidential if this is possible?”