The On Assignment podcast is brought to you by the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Awards. We went behind the scenes with some of the 2018 winning organizations—you can see the full list of 2018 winners here.
A Russian journalist is murdered in St. Petersburg – not for what he’s reported, but for being gay. Reveal exposes what it’s like to be gay today in Russia, where hateful rhetoric against the LGBT community appears on a daily basis on TV and in speeches by politicians. In "Russia's New Scapegoats," Reveal from the Center For Investigative Reporting teamed up with Coda Story to trace the roots of the anti-gay movement in Russia and the former Soviet Union.
Amy McKinnon, Natalia Anteleva from Coda Story and Katharine Mieszkowski from Reveal explain how they reported the story, and the security risks of reporting on homophobic and transphobic hate groups, and how they brought the story to American audiences. Reveal, Coda Story and PRX have won a 2018 duPont-Columbia Award for their episode "Russia's New Scapegoats."