Politico health care editor Shawn Zeller, global technology editor Steve Heuser, deputy managing editor, policy, Darius Dixon, managing editor, policy, Clea Benson, and senior executive editor Alex Burns sent out the following:
We’re thrilled to announce two moves to supercharge the editing ranks on Tech and Health Care, teams that will be at the epicenter of POLITICO’s policy coverage as we enter the second year of the Trump administration and gear up for the midterms.
John Hewitt Jones, a veteran congressional policy editor at Bloomberg Government, will join us as a deputy editor on the Tech team. Erin Schumaker, a standout Health Care reporter, will move into the role of deputy Health Care editor. Both bring sharp instincts, deep subject-matter expertise, and the energy to help drive our coverage during this critical season.
John’s arrival will strengthen our tech coverage in Washington and on Capitol Hill, continuing to build the momentum we’ve been creating with the tech team expansion in California and other investments in this area throughout our global newsroom. At BGov, John served as team lead for congressional policy coverage across tech, defense, health care, and transportation. He is the former managing editor of FedScoop, a Washington-based publication focused on IT policy within the federal government, where his team won a SABEW award for its coverage of emerging technology and federal modernization efforts.
He previously worked as a financial journalist in New York City and London, covering international insurance companies and markets for Euromoney Institutional Investor. He began his career as a general news reporter for U.K. national and regional newspapers, including The Sunday Times of London, The Scotsman, and The Gloucester Citizen.
John holds a bachelor’s degree in English literature from the University of Edinburgh and a master’s degree in social policy from the London School of Economics. He lives on Capitol Hill with his wife, Laura, and their rescue dog, Ava. He’ll report to Steve Heuser.
Erin’s promotion to editor on Health Care will position the team to continue its record of standout coverage as the Trump administration disrupts the government role in medicine and as health care affordability becomes a defining issue of the midterms.
She has distinguished herself during nearly three years of reporting with some of our most absorbing features. She has profiled politicians’ more off-beat fascinations, from Sen. Chris Murphy and former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy’s efforts to help Americans make friends, to all the Republican former military officers in Congress promoting psychedelic medicine alongside RFK Jr. This year, she examined how Trump’s health department, under pressure from Laura Loomer, is appealing to animal lovers. She’s proven adept at shepherding large cross-team projects, as she did in her September piece on Russ Vought’s efforts to downsize the bureaucracy, and last December on the Covid critiques of Trump’s health nominees.
Before joining POLITICO, Erin led science coverage at Business Insider, reported on the Covid-19 pandemic for ABC News, and covered public health crises at HuffPost. A Northwestern and Union College grad, she lives in Brooklyn. She’ll report to Shawn Zeller.
