Huffington Magazine Issue 2 | Page 82

INSIDE THE CULT deHarris protégé, had won out (Mahtesian and Burns declined to comment). Harris says he has simply freed Mahtesian from day-to-day editing duties so he can write more for the site. “We know we have this genius, this rain man of politics in our midst, and we were not getting his insights onto the site often enough,” Harris says, adding that Mahtesian is “the smartest guy in Washington when it comes to politics.” Every newsroom can be a cauldron of personality conflicts, staff rivalries and heated spats between reporters and editors but Politico has still gained a reputation over the years as a stressful, hamster wheel environment, where expectations aren’t just about staying late to cover breaking news — as any Politico reporter would do — but essentially being on call, nights and weekends, for even the most granular piece of political news. Politico staffers routinely talk of a Politico “star-system” in which a handful of reporters in the VandeHarris orbit receive preferential treatment from company leadership, while the majority are left drifting in a far off journalistic galaxy. One former staffer likens the newsroom to The Hunger Games, in which young people HUFFINGTON 06.24.12 fight to the death for the enjoyment of a privileged class. Last fall, a plagiarism scandal involving a young Politico reporter who had been churning out transportation policy stories for Pro led to several damage control meetings involving managers and staff. In response, Politico set up a mentorship program to help reporters making their way in its competitive newsroom. Still, current and former staffers don’t expect Politico brass to have much tolerance for complaints about the workload and several recall COO Kingsley famously dismissing anonymous grumbling in a 2010 Times profile of Allen. She said “people who whine about working at Politico shouldn’t be at Politico,” and that “they likely lack the metabolism and professional drive it takes to thrive here.” To be sure, Politico offers reporters a platform read widely in the corridors of Washington power and a brand name that will allow even cub reporters to get their calls quickly returned from Capitol Hill and the White House. Yet many of them do burn out. Some staffers