Illinois agribusiness and status of workers

Cora Lewis

Cora Lewis covers workers and the business of agriculture for The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting, a nonprofit newsroom based in Champaign, Illinois. Prior to joining The Midwest Center, Lewis reported on labor and breaking news for BuzzFeed News, where she received a Front Page Award from The Newswomen’s Club of New York for stories covering on-call scheduling. Her work has led to the resignation of an abusive CEO and has been featured on “This American Life.” She has followed minimum wage movements, teachers’ strikes, automation, the on-demand economy, alternative organizing models and union politics. Born and raised in New York City, Lewis received her bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Yale University and her master’s in fiction from Washington University in St. Louis.

Investigate Midwest

The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting is an award-winning investigative news site based in Champaign, Illinois. It serves the public by providing in-depth journalism on agribusiness and related topics and issues. It also seeks to provide the education and training of journalists and students to improve the quality and breadth of news coverage of agribusiness.The Midwest Center predominantly covers issues throughout 12 states in the heartland of the U.S, with a frequent focus on Illinois and rural communities.

Amanda Pérez Pintado

Amanda Pérez Pintado covers Illinois' agriculture businesses and workers for The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting, a nonprofit news site based in Champaign, Illinois. She previously reported on trending topics and local events in South Florida as an intern at the Spanish-language news outlet El Nuevo Herald. She holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Puerto Rico's Río Piedras campus and a master's from New York University. While there, this multimedia reporter covered immigrant voters in the New Hampshire 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, the pandemic and Puerto Rico for Pavement Pieces, an NYU news site. Pérez Pintado was editor-in-chief of the student-run publication Latin America News Dispatch, which covers Latin America, the Caribbean and Latinos in the U.S., and in her native Puerto Rico she has reported for El Nuevo Día, the island's main paper.

Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting

The Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting is an award-winning investigative news site based in Champaign, Illinois. It serves the public by providing in-depth journalism on agribusiness and related topics and issues. It also seeks to provide the education and training of journalists and students to improve the quality and breadth of news coverage of agribusiness.The Midwest Center predominantly covers issues throughout 12 states in the heartland of the U.S, with a frequent focus on Illinois and rural communities.