The Tarbell Center for AI Journalism, the nonprofit that supports journalism helping society navigate advanced AI, announced a new $10 million institutional grants program to fund newsrooms, media ventures and series focused on AI.Tarbell aims to distribute at least $10 million by the end of 2027. Grants can go to new reporting teams, investigative units and verticals at existing outlets, and to new media ventures and series.
The first two grantees are NPR’s Power and Influence team, which receives $250,000, and “Machine Gods,” which receives $480,000.
“Machine Gods” is a new video-first show from Casey Newton and Kevin Roose, launching in October in partnership with NPR. It will run twice a week and be free to watch and listen to.
Priority areas include accountability reporting on frontier AI companies, investigations into lobbying and campaign financing, AI policy in the U.S., UK and EU, incident reporting, foundational explainers and analysis, AI’s transformative potential, AI developments in China, and AI’s impact on labor markets.
Grants will support organizations, teams and series, with editorial decisions remaining entirely with the recipient newsroom. Editorial independence is core to Tarbell’s mission, and our grantees maintain complete autonomy over their reporting.
Applications for this round are open to newsrooms and media ventures until Dec. 11, 2026.
