Paul E. Steiger was the founding editor-in-chief, CEO and president of ProPublica from 2008 through 2012, and part-time executive chairman from 2013 through 2020.
Steiger served as the managing editor of the Wall Street Journal from 1991 to 2007. During his tenure, members of the Journal’s newsroom staff were awarded 16 Pulitzer Prizes. In addition, ProPublica reporters received Pulitzer Prizes in May 2010 and 2011.
He is a senior adviser to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, based in Arlington, Virginia, which provides free legal assistance to journalists. He was a trustee of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, based in Miami, that funds efforts to enhance journalism and the functioning of American communities. He is a board member and treasurer of the Global Editors Network, based in Paris. From 1999 to 2007, he was a member of the Pulitzer Prize Board, serving as its chairman in his final year. For six years, from June 2005 to June 2011, Steiger was the chairman of the Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based nonprofit that advocates for press freedom around the globe.
Awards include the Columbia Journalism Award, the University of Missouri Honor Medal for Distinguished Service in Journalism, the Goldsmith Career Award for Excellence in Journalism from Harvard University’s Joan Shorenstein Center, the Gerald Loeb Award for lifetime achievement from the John E. Anderson Graduate School of Management at UCLA, the William Allen White National Citation from the University of Kansas's White School of Journalism and Mass Communications, the University of Arizona's John Peter and Anna Catherine Zenger Award, the Dean’s Medal for Distinguished Leadership from Brandeis University, the Fourth Estate Award from the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., the National Press Foundation’s George Beveridge Editor of the Year Award, the Decade of Excellence Award from the World Leadership Forum in London, the Freedom of the Press Award from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, and the American Society of News Editors Leadership Award.
Steiger worked for 15 years as a reporter, the Washington economics correspondent, and the business editor for the Los Angeles Times, and for 26 years as a reporter and editor for the Wall Street Journal. He received a bachelor’s degree in economics from Yale University in 1964. In 2013 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree by Columbia University.
