Pulitzer Prize's finalists includes coverage of massive WA flooding

The Seattle Times wasnamed as a Pulitzer prize finalistfor their 2025 coverage of Western Washington’s historic flooding.

The Seattle Times was named a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for breaking news, after its coverage of the flooding in Western Washington the fall of 2025.

The paper, in an announcement Monday, May 4, was recognized in the “Breaking News Reporting” category for “work that in real time warned residents, relayed the stories of affect communities and explained how weather and geography combined to cause the devastation.” The jury cited seven articles from December 2025 that reported on evacuation orders and resident rescues.

The Minnesota Star Tribune won the top prize for their coverage of a Catholic school shooting last summer, and the staffs of the Southern California News Group and The Wall Street Journal were also named finalists.

What are the Pulitzer prizes?

The prize, known as journalism’s highest honor, is awarded yearly across 23 categories in journalism and the arts, including categories for books, drama and music. Named after the 19th-century journalist Joseph Pulitzer, the Pulizters have been awarded since their inception in 1917.

How many Pulitzers has The Seattle Times won?

Staffers of The Seattle Times have won the prize 11 times since 1950 and been named as finalists another 15 times,accordingto the paper.

In 2020, a group of reporters coveringBoeing’s 737 MAX controversywon the National Reporting Category. The paper has been honored in the Breaking News category before, with their2015 coverage of a landslidethat killed 43 people.

2026 Pulitzer Prize Winners

Public Service: The Washington Post
Breaking News Reporting: Staff of The Minnesota Star Tribune
Investigative Reporting: Staff of The New York Times
Explanatory Reporting: Susie Neilson, Megan Fan Munce and Sara DiNatale of the San Francisco Chronicle
Beat Reporting: Jeff Horwitz and Engen Tham of Reuters
Local Reporting: Dave Altimari and Ginny Monk of The Connecticut Mirror and Sophie Chou and Haru Coryne of ProPublica; Staff of the Chicago Tribune
National Reporting: Staff of Reuters, notably Ned Parker, Linda So, Peter Eisler and Mike Spector
International Reporting: Dake Kang, Garance Burke, Byron Tau, Aniruddha Ghosal and Yael Grauer, contributor, of Associated Press
Feature Writing: Aaron Parsley of Texas Monthly
Criticism: Mark Lamster of The Dallas Morning News
Opinion Writing: M. Gessen of The New York Times
Illustrated Reporting and Commentary: Anand RK and Suparna Sharma, contributors, and Natalie Obiko Pearson of Bloomberg
Breaking News Photography: Saher Alghorra, contributor, The New York Times
Feature Photography: Jahi Chikwendiu of The Washington Post
Audio Reporting: Staff of Pablo Torre Finds Out
Fiction: Angel Down, by Daniel Kraus (Atria Books)
Drama: Liberation, by Bess Wohl
History: We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution, by Jill Lepore (Liveright)
Biography: Pride and Pleasure: The Schuyler Sisters in an Age of Revolution, by Amanda Vaill (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Memoir or Autobiography: Things in Nature Merely Grow, by Yiyun Li (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Poetry: Ars Poeticas, by Juliana Spahr (Wesleyan University Press)
General Nonfiction: There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America, by Brian Goldstone (Crown)
Music: Picaflor: A Future Myth, by Gabriela Lena Frank (G. Schirmer, Inc.)
Special Citations and Awards: Julie K. Brown