CHLOE SHRAGER
About Me.
I am a California-based journalist currently reporting on courts and crime for the San Luis Obispo Tribune, a McClatchy newspaper on the Central Coast. I covered local government for my first year and a half in SLO County — one of the most politically contentious in the state. On that beat, I broke the story on election fraud allegations against two candidates in 2024, later reported on one of the candidate’s court proceedings and covered local impacts of the second Trump administration, focusing on immigration.
The stories I find most important bring strong, investigative journalism to a local level. Across both beats, I investigated a shady nonprofit bankruptcy near me and broke the story on a church’s five-year cover-up of their pastor’s misconduct. He resigned as a result of my reporting.
Within my first six months at The Tribune, I won a first place California Journalism Award for my coverage of county LGBTQAI+ policy and second and fourth place awards for my local election reporting. I wrote a column on nuclear risk for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and continue to report on the topic, endlessly driven to show how radiation continuously and disproportionately impacts the most vulnerable. Previously, I covered breaking news for the San Francisco Chronicle, where I also headed up a data-driven series on the rising cost of private schools.
I graduated from Stanford with a Political Science degree, concentrating on nuclear weapons policy, human rights and journalism. In that vein, I aim to tell human stories of global importance.
My junior year at Stanford, I spent a six months reporting an investigative feature on the Marshall Islands’ nuclear testing legacy. I am a signatory to the Nuclear Truth Project’s Rights, Respect, and Reciprocity Protocols for Seeking Nuclear Truth with Integrity.
In my free time, you'll likely find me outdoors — surfing on the Central Coast, skiing in Lake Tahoe, backpacking with friends or leading expeditions as a certified trip leader, or playing rugby, though I am now retired from my college club athlete days.
Browse my portfolio below and don’t hesitate to reach out for a virtual coffee.
Forgotten Fallout.
Forgotten Fallout.
As one of two undergraduate recipients of Stanford's 2023 Steve Steinberg Reporting Award, I traveled to the Marshall Islands, Arkansas, Oahu and New York to report on the ongoing impacts of the United States' mid-century nuclear testing legacy in the Marshall Islands amid the renegotiation of a key international treaty, the Compact of Free Association.
I studied this history for years prior to my six-month investigation, which took me to places few other journalists have ever been on Majuro (the capital of the Marshall Islands), Ebeye Island and the U.S. military base on Kwajalein Atoll. I spoke to countless members of Marshallese parliament and community advocates, including some of the last remaining survivors of radioactive exposure to nuclear fallout who had never been interviewed before. I conducted in-depth archival research to uncover previously unreported, declassified government documents.
My investigative feature was published Inkstick Media with original photojournalism and maps.