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City Cast DC

Kaela Cote-Stemmermann

How closely did you pay attention to local news this year? Take our end-of-year news quiz to find out! Oh, and no Googling!

Take the Quiz! 

City Cast DC staff

Beloved newsletter editor Kaela Cote-Stemmermann is taking a new role at City Cast DC, where she will cover food and culture and author a weekly newsletter called “Obsessed.” Her newsletter, 

, will feature original reporting and local recs that bring readers closer to D.C.

Kaela joined City Cast DC in 2022. Over the past four years as Senior Newsletter Editor, she published more than 1,000 editions of City Cast DC’s popular daily newsletter, delivering smart, digestible local news to Washingtonians. Under her authorship, the newsletter grew by more than 60,000 subscribers, becoming one of the most-read newsletters in the City Cast network.

Her food writing has taken her across the city, from interviewing the DMV’s first 3-star Michelin chef 

 at the Inn at Little Washington to sharing a bowl of spicy noodles with 

 whose celebrated Chinese restaurants pioneered D.C.’s Sichuan cooking scene. She also 

, a social restaurant-ranking app quietly reshaping how D.C. foodies discover and track their meals, interviewing the app's top-ranked D.C. user.

 are beloved, including her original “Walk a Mile” series where she explores a mile-long stretch in D.C., uncovering everything from Ethiopian breakfasts to natural wine bars along the way.

," a love letter to Washington that resonated widely during the city's federal takeover, an ongoing guide to 

“As City Cast DC expands, moving Kaela into a reporting role made so much sense,” said Senior Executive Producer Annie Rees. “Over the four years she’s been at City Cast, she has built a loyal following of readers — the team often jokes she’s our local celebrity, because of how excited people are to meet her at member events — and her writing frequently makes me laugh out loud. I’m so excited to read “Obsessed” and I know the rest of D.C. will be too.”

“I was a fan of Kaela before I even joined City Cast,” said Managing Editor Yu Vongkiatkajorn. “Her voice, curation, and sense of humor always made the newsletter a pleasure to read. I’m so excited for Kaela to bring her skills to this beat, help us make the most out of living in D.C., and share all the weird and wonderful things about this city.”

Previously, Kaela worked in communications at the Department of State and covered antitrust and competition law at Global Competition Review.

A Boston native and graduate of Scripps College in Los Angeles, Kaela lives in Adams Morgan with a cranky cat. When she isn’t sleuthing for local gossip, you can find her biking around to her favorite cafes.

Yu Vongkiatkajorn Joins City Cast DC as Managing Editor

Yu Vongkiatkajorn is joining City Cast DC as Managing Editor. She’ll edit the beat reporters’ original reporting and their newsletters. Yu is the second editor hired as part of a major expansion in City Cast DC’s newsroom.

Yu Vongkiatkajorn is an editor who has helped lead coverage and audience strategy at The Washington Post. Most recently, she served as the breaking news and general assignment editor on the Metro desk, where she led a team focused on timely, original stories about life in the Washington region.

Earlier at the Post, Yu worked on initiatives to reach new audiences, helping launch newsletters, podcasts and other editorial experiments in collaboration with product, marketing and analytics teams. She also developed a process for conducting newsroom analyses and providing strategic recommendations.

“When we began looking for the right person to fill this role, one person’s name kept coming up: ‘Yu – have you met Yu?’ ‘Hire Yu,’” said Annie Rees, Senior Executive Producer of City Cast DC.” From the moment we talked with her, it was clear why she was so universally regarded by reporters and editors she worked with. Sharp, clear-headed and creative, with years of Metro and Audience experience to boot, she is a crucial piece in making City Cast DC a local powerhouse.”

Yu will be working alongside Michael Schaffer, City Cast DC’s Executive Editor, to shape CCDC’s new products. “We want to publish impactful, attention-getting journalism about Washington even as the local media environment undergoes a wild shift,” Schaffer said. “Yu immediately got the idea of galvanizing a team to do stuff that connects with an audience and obliges that audience to follow what we're up to.”

Yu began her journalism career at Mother Jones in San Francisco. She grew up in Chiang Mai, Thailand, and is a graduate of Wesleyan University and the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.

Emma Uber is joining Cast Cast DC as a reporter. She'll write a twice-weekly newsletter with the juiciest, most memorable, most consequential stories playing out in the DMV. Emma is the first reporter hired as part of a major expansion in City Cast DC's newsroom.

Previously, Emma covered local breaking news and public safety for The Washington Post, where she distinguished herself with scoops and sharp stories. Emma began covering D.C. police for The Post just days before President Donald Trump federalized the city's police force and deployed the National Guard. She analyzed 

 to deliver a comprehensive account of how an unprecedented federal law enforcement surge was playing out on the District’s streets and doggedly covered 

Her reporting on a change to U.S. Park Police's 

 caused two Democratic lawmakers to open an investigation and her coverage of federal agents shooting at drivers during traffic stops was referenced as the D.C. Council passed emergency legislation requiring the city police department to release body-camera footage when a local officer witnesses a federal officer shoot someone.

“Emma is a rare talent – a brilliant, passionate, high-energy journalist,” said Annie Rees, Senior Executive Producer of City Cast DC. “With Emma as a reporter, City Cast DC will evolve into the city’s most indispensable – and most fun – place to find local coverage. We look forward to announcing the other reporters who will join Emma in the coming days.”

Hoosier born-and-raised, Emma graduated from Indiana University, where she earned degrees in journalism and international studies. Prior to moving to D.C. and joining the Washington Post in 2024, she covered breaking news at the Tampa Bay Times, interned with Indianapolis Monthly magazine, and worked with the national investigative team at USA Today.

Michael Schaffer Joins City Cast as Executive Editor 

Michael Schaffer is joining City Cast DC full-time as a host and executive editor as the national podcast network begins staffing a local Washington newsroom to complement and expand its daily audio and newsletter offerings.

A D.C. native and former editor-in-chief of both Washington City Paper and Washingtonian magazine, Schaffer is one of the most experienced editors and writers in local Washington. During his eight years at Washingtonian, the magazine was twice judged America’s best big-city magazine. He most recently wrote the Capital City column in Politico.

A co-host of City Cast DC since its 2022 launch, he’s developed a reputation with listeners for a deep knowledge of the city, an ability to find humor in the city’s quirks, and a willingness to ask probing questions of political leaders and fellow journalists alike.

Schaffer’s hire comes as City Cast, a nationwide network of local podcasts, is in the midst of an expansion in D.C., with plans to hire a staff of local journalists to focus on robust coverage of city politics, regional business, local culture, as well as the personalities and institutions that make the city tick.

In his new role, Schaffer will continue to anchor City Cast DC’s flagship daily podcast alongside co-host Bridget Todd. He’ll also help shape City Cast DC’s new team of reporters and produce his own column about his hometown at a moment of radical disruption.

Schaffer arrives as City Cast undergoes an unprecedented expansion of its local newsroom, hiring a team of journalists to create original reporting about the D.C. area. The new journalists will enable City Cast DC to roll out additional newsletters, podcasts, articles, and social offerings.

“As he's proved time and time again in the past 30 years, Michael Schaffer is the smartest, most insightful, and funniest observer of local Washington,” said City Cast CEO David Plotz. “He can do it all: Podcast! Report! Write! Edit! With Michael as our Executive Editor, City Cast DC is going to be the city’s must-listen and must-read.”

City Cast is a network of daily local news podcasts and newsletters in 13 cities around the country, covering news, culture, and things to do in your community. Owned by Graham Holdings Co. in Arlington, VA, City Cast aims to be the smartest, easiest way to connect with the place you live and love.

City Cast DC is undergoing an unprecedented expansion of its local newsroom, hiring a team of journalists to create original reporting about the D.C. area. 

Kaela Cote-Stemmermann Is City Cast DC’s New Food and Culture Reporter

News and updates about the City Cast DC podcast and Hey DC newsletter.

City Cast DC Announcements

Announcements

Emma Uber

Days before Jeffery Carroll was sworn in as the interim D.C. police chief in January, his soon-to-be second-in-command Andre Wright sent

an AI-generated video to his wife. The video, according to an internal report, showed Carroll puffing on a cigar and laughing while crowing, “The wicked witch is dead bitches. There’s a new sheriff in town.”

The message, sent from Wright’s department-issued cellphone, came amid the dramatic departure of former Chief Pamela Smith, who elevated Wright through the ranks and put him in charge of all of the department’s patrol operations. Wright and his wife, Inspector Natasha Wright, were among the 13 officials served termination papers last week in connection to the crime statistics scandal – but they had already been put on administrative leave months earlier, in March, for inappropriate text messages found on Wright’s work phone.

I reviewed an 18-page internal affairs synopsis of the investigation into Wright’s text messages with his wife, who works in the police department’s human resources department. The report shows that Wright repeatedly questioned crime classifications, solicited sex acts and derided colleagues and subordinates.

In one message, seemingly during a 9 a.m. meeting, Wright texted his wife, “This Big Tittie bitch can’t read.” In another, he appeared to reference a work trip as he wrote, “I’m going out of town with a fat ugly bitch, will be back tomorrow," followed by “I’m taking two midgets with me.” And

after a March 2025 shooting in which a man had been shot in the leg, Wright texted his wife to “make sure this stupid mother fucka didn’t shoot himself and is lying.”

The D.C. police department is in turmoil over a 554-page report outlining a pattern of manipulating data in ways that falsely made the city look safer. 

 and Congress and the Justice Department are investigating. The officials are all on administrative leave pending the results of the department's disciplinary process, during which they can appeal the decision.

But the text messages represent a different outrage — and one that, beyond its prurience, reveals a lot about the police department. A search of Wright’s phone as part of the crime statistics investigation yielded messages that suggest the department's issues extend beyond data classification. Rather than a coordinated conspiracy, the messages make clear that the police brass accused of manipulation are at war with one another as well.

The texts are also a stark departure from the preaching persona Wright has built for himself as de-facto second-in-command of the department. At Smith’s farewell ceremony in December, Wright delivered a speech comparing their relationship to Paul and Timothy's in the Bible. He at times preached or prayed during D.C. police meetings, according to three law enforcement officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private matters. But in light of surfaced messages, as one official put it, his conduct seems like “striking hypocrisy.”

“To hear the sanctimoniousness from Chief Wright and Natasha Wright who were at best unprofessional and at worst downright scandalous… it’s just remarkable,” said Pamela Keith, an attorney for a captain accused of crime data manipulation. “It’s indicative of a complete absence of moral compass.”

Andre and Natasha Wright did not respond to multiple requests for comment. A D.C. police spokesperson said the Wrights are on administrative leave, but cited pending internal matters and declined to answer further questions, including whether Wright’s messages were indicative of the police department’s culture.

D.C. police also declined to answer why the report is dated January 14, 2026, but the Wrights were not placed on leave until March.

Some of Wright’s messages discovered in January are also referenced in the 554-page internal affairs report on crime data manipulation 

. While investigators found that there was no evidence that Wright “specifically directed the misclassification of crimes on a large scale,” they pointed to some messages included in the January report to assert that “he was aware of, and supported, the practice.”

In one message, he sent his wife a screenshot of a section of the D.C. Code detailing the elements necessary to classify a crime as taking property without a right – a category investigators found was frequently abused to lower the number of reported thefts.

In another message, he reminded Natasha to ask a captain in the department about the classification. About a half-hour later, he texted her to follow up: “Have you been practicing? Did you reclassify that Theft?”

The internal investigations come after months of heightened scrutiny from President Donald Trump. Last summer, Trump took over the D.C. police force and cited out of control crime as justification. Critics pointed to the city’s plummeting crime rates, but Trump seized on long-circulated rumors that some police department managers regularly downgraded crime classifications to avoid being reprimanded by top brass.

The Justice Department and the House Oversight Committee conducted investigations, both of which railed against the leadership style of Smith and many of her inner circle. However, neither of the investigations identified a time when Smith or another leader explicitly ordered the misclassification of crime. Smith has denied wrongdoing.

This is not the first time Wright has found himself embroiled in controversy. In 2021, his ex-wife reported he was having an affair with a subordinate lieutenant: Natasha, his current wife. And former D.C. Police Sgt. Charlotte Djossou, who recently self-published a book about the “narcissistic culture” within the department, 

that she had a “consensual sexual relationship” (including threesomes) with Wright while he was her superior and still married to his first wife.

The report shows Wright sent Natasha two links to Djossou’s Instagram profile on Dec. 13, 2025, the same day the 21-year veteran of the department posted about a TV interview she did alleging department leadership had been cooking the books for years. Djossou filed a whistleblower lawsuit in 2020 alleging the department retaliated against her for speaking up, and the lawsuit was settled last year.

Wright also sent his wife links to a court filing and news articles about the ongoing lawsuit brought against the police department by Capt. Paul Hrebenak, who alleges that Wright and other senior leaders retaliated against him for taking parental leave as a gay man.

The Wrights also seemed to hold particular disdain for certain D.C. police leaders, including Cmdr. Michael Pulliam and Capt. Rachel Pulliam, who were also named in the crime data investigation.

Michael Pulliam was the first D.C. police official to be placed on administrative leave for allegedly downgrading crimes in May 2025. And both he and his wife were among the 13 officials served termination papers last week. In a lawsuit earlier this year, the couple claimed they are facing retaliation for pushing back against Smith and her inner circle, including Wright.

The month before Michael Pulliam’s suspension, Rachel Pulliam was abruptly transferred from the Youth and Family Engagement Division to midnights in the 7th District. She said this happened after she pushed back against then-chief Smith’s directive to rescind some detectives' approved time off.

Rachel Pulliam filed a whistleblower complaint, then Wright ordered Michael Pulliam to pack up her office. That prompted Michael Pulliam to file an equal employment opportunity complaint against Wright. A week later, he was put on leave.

Text messages surfaced in the January investigation show that Wright sent a photo of Michael Pulliam and other officials with the message, “He looks broken,” and, “He is fucked” on April 30 – the same week Pulliam filed a complain against Wright. Natasha responded with two laughing crying emojis.

In August, the report shows Natasha texted, “I just saw that liar Rachel.” The Wrights discussed seeing Rachel Pulliam with another police official, then said they pulled his internal investigation log numbers and “snitched” on him.

“They are royalty to the white boys… they all believe that we are in their way,” Wright texted.

Rachel Pulliam said seeing the texts was difficult, but also validated her feelings that she was being watched by the head of human resources and assistant chief.

“I felt the retaliation, I felt the hostility,” she said. “I felt like I was being gaslit into thinking that this wasn’t happening. And to see those text messages on a department phone so boldly targeting my husband and I after I made these protected disclosures… it was emotional.”

She said she was particularly disturbed by the fact that they appeared to open an investigation into a captain for speaking with her.

“That scares me because it sends this message to the rest of the department that not only should you not stand up for what’s right, but it might not just be your job, it could be everyone else’s around you.”

The most frequently discussed topic in the messages from the report by far – more than crime classifications, colleagues or Carroll – was sex.

In messages to his wife, Wright requests oral and anal sex, sends her old pictures of him and asks if she would have sex with “young Andre” and tells her she owes him “ghetto pussy” for shoveling snow out of two parking spaces.

Some of the messages become bizarre – a link to an Instagram video titled, “POV - You’re a Sassy Gay Recruit in the Academy Getting Pepper Sprayed,” and “Come suck on my toes, individually!!!!”

I would wager it’s the first time in D.C. police history that an internal affairs report has included a footnote explaining the term WAP.

An internal report shows ex-executive assistant chief Andre Wright repeatedly sent crude texts and mocked colleagues.

Inside the NSFW text messages that got a top D.C. police official put on leave

"Downright scandalous:" Inside the NSFW text messages that got a top D.C. police official put on leave

Local News

Get the story that everyone in Washington is talking about. Sign up for Emma Uber's newsletter, DC Dispatch. It takes you deeper into the scandals, disputes and delights in Washington.

D.C. Local News

The DC Dispatch

With Congress demanding internal documents and the police union gloating about the proposed sacking of 13 top officials, interim police chief

Jeffery Carroll met the press Tuesday, a day after he moved to clean house over manipulated crime data.

It made for quite a spectacle in a department that in recent years has faced leadership turnover and intensified federal scrutiny. Carroll opened by confirming the rumors: All 13 of the proposed firings are related to an internal investigation into crime data manipulation, he said.

He confirmed the restructuring of the department began yesterday with the shuttering of an office formerly led by the department’s second-in-command, as well as a series of transfers and promotions to fill the positions of officials under investigation. 

After news of the pending firings first broke in the Washington Post, I was the 

first to report the details of the department’s restructuring

 after obtaining internal communications sent Monday evening. The officials are all on administrative leave pending the results of the department's “trial board” disciplinary process, where they can appeal the decision.

But Carroll refused to disclose the findings of the internal investigation, citing personnel matters. That transparency seems pretty essential given that the alleged manipulation of crime statistics cuts to the basic question of whether Carroll’s department is trustworthy – and could serve as further reason for President Donald Trump to seize control in the District. Trump has zeroed in on long-standing complaints about crime misclassification, using it to justify his takeover of the D.C. police department and declaration of a crime emergency last summer even as D.C. crime rates fell.

Carroll also declined to answer why he was moving to dismiss top officers when even scathing Justice Department and House Oversight Committee reports haven’t actually identified any case of top brass ordering underclassification of crimes. (Those reports merely cited an overall toxic culture as the culprit for inaccurate stats).

And when asked whether D.C. police have heeded Republican Rep. James Comer’s 

public demands to hand over the investigation

, Carroll was vague, saying he is “in communication" with the House Oversight Committee chairman about the request.

But he was clear on one point: crime is still down in the District.

“We have made meaningful progress over the last three years in reducing crime,” he said. “Homicides, shootings and car jackings have fallen steadily since 2023.”

Want to follow Emma's work? Sign up for her newsletter, which launches May 20.

D.C. began the year with its longest stretch without a homicide in decades and – even after a spate of killings in April – the homicide rate is down 42 percent compared to this time last year. And last year, D.C. already experienced its fewest slayings since 2017. Even crime statistic skeptics generally agree that these numbers are accurate – it’s hard to fudge the stats when there’s a dead body and a grieving family.

Carroll also said he still trusts the police department’s crime data and depends on it each morning to guide deployment decisions.

He also confirmed the details I reported yesterday on the departmental restructuring. Christopher Dorsey will replace Tatjana Savoy as Second District Commander and Nikki Lavenhouse will replace LaShay Makal as assistant chief of patrol services south. He said the commanders have “already hit the ground running” in their new roles.

The shuttered office, the Office of Patrol Operations, was established in 2024 by former chief Pamela Smith and had been led by executive assistant police chief Andre Wright. Wright’s name appeared multiple times in a draft Justice Department report on alleged crime statistics manipulation at the department. He had been placed on administrative leave earlier this year after an investigation surfaced inappropriate text messages on his work phone, according to two law enforcement officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

On Tuesday, both the House Oversight Committee and the D.C. police union gloated. In a scathing statement, Comer took credit for the pending terminations and railed against D.C. leaders for “running cover for corrupt MPD officials.” And Gregg Pemberton, president of the union, called the disciplinary actions long overdue.

“Justice is being served,” Pemberton said in a statement. “The command staff officials responsible for this betrayal must be held accountable, not just for the sake of the thousands of dedicated MPD officers they undermined, but for the residents of the District of Columbia who deserve honest leadership and real public safety. The corruption that endangered lives, eroded trust, and allowed shooters, robbers, and predators to evade justice cannot be tolerated.”

Jeffery Carroll also confirmed the restructuring of the department. 

Police Chief: 13 Top Officials Face Termination Amid Crime Stats Scandal 

Multiple high-ranking D.C. police leaders have been informed the department intends to fire them based on findings from an internal investigation into crime data manipulation, according to three police officials familiar with the matter.

The changes could constitute a sweeping restructuring of department leadership – one that was already underway Monday evening, when interim police chief Jeffery Carroll abolished the Office of Patrol Operations, effective immediately.

The office – established by former police chief Pamela Smith in Oct. 2024 to oversee all patrol operations – was run by executive assistant police chief Andre Wright. Widely considered second-in-command under Carroll, Wright’s name appeared multiple times in a draft Justice Department report on alleged crime statistic manipulation at the department. He had been placed on administrative leave earlier this year after an investigation surfaced inappropriate text messages on his work phone, according to two law enforcement officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

A D.C. police official said no one other than Wright would lose their job due to the abolishment of the office, and all functions are being moved to other bureaus.

But the shakeup doesn’t end with Wright. According to internal D.C. police communications I reviewed, officers received a message signed by Carroll just after 7 p.m. Monday advising them of five transfers and seven promotions. Among them, Christopher Dorsey will replace Tatjana Savoy, who is facing termination, as Second District Commander. And Nikki Lavenhouse will replace LaShay Makal, who is facing termination, as assistant chief of patrol services south. 

It’s not clear yet whether all of the firings are tied to allegations of cooking the books to make crime rates appear lower. Some officials – including assistant chiefs and commanders – were served termination papers, according to the officials. Others were informed of disciplinary measures. Those accused of misconduct will go through the department’s “trial board” disciplinary process, where they can appeal the decision.

The pending terminations come after months of heightened scrutiny from President Donald Trump, including probes into the police force from the Justice Department and the House Oversight Committee. The police union has publicly applauded the intervention and some officers voluntarily cooperated, seizing the opportunity to address long-standing concerns with leadership.

A D.C. police spokesperson declined to comment on Monday, saying he cannot discuss personnel matters or internal investigations.

At least some of the officials I spoke to told me it’s about time. A D.C. police officer described the sentiment of the department in one word: “finally.”

Another member of the department’s top brass said both the police union and rank-and-file officers are “very pleased someone is finally addressing this in a meaningful way.” He added that it has renewed many in the department’s faith in Carroll, who took the helm of the department after Smith resigned in December.

“It goes to show we’re not standing for any shenanigans,” the official said. “We have to protect the agency. We have to protect the city.”

Last summer, Trump took over the D.C. police force and cited out of control crime as justification. Critics pointed to the city’s plummeting crime rates, but Trump seized on long-circulated rumors that some police department managers regularly downgraded crime classifications to avoid being reprimanded by top brass.

As evidence, Trump pointed to Commander Michael Pulliam, who was placed on paid leave while under investigation for allegedly manipulating crime statistics in D.C. police’s Third District. He has denied wrongdoing.

The Justice Department and the House Oversight Committee conducted investigations, both of which railed against the leadership style of Smith and many of her inner circle.

However, neither of the investigations identified a time when Smith or another leader explicitly ordered the misclassification of crime. Instead, the Justice Department report cited a “culture of fear” that indirectly led officials to downplay crime rates in an attempt to dodge Smith’s wrath.

Smith has vehemently denied allegations that she ordered any manipulation of statistics.

House Oversight Committee Rep. James Comer, a Republican, wrote a letter last week demanding all the records from the police department’s internal investigation. 

House Oversight Republicans gloated at the news of the potential firings in a 

 Monday, claiming its letter "is already forcing action inside the MPD."

"Now they must release EVERY document from their internal investigation into manipulated crime data," the post read. "This isn't over. We're not stopping until the full truth is out."

The D.C. Office of the Inspector General also began a review of D.C. police crime data reporting in January. That review has not been released.

The changes could constitute a sweeping restructuring of department leadership.

Multiple D.C. Police Leaders Face Termination Over Crime Data Manipulation

Yu Vongkiatkajorn

Hey D.C., I’m Yu, City Cast DC’s new managing editor overseeing our reporters. 

I was one of the journalists laid off at the Washington Post, and I joined City Cast because I believe deeply in its mission of helping residents stay connected and providing original reporting for the city. We’ve been growing our staff and adding more reporting to our website, podcast and newsletters — and we’re only getting started.

We have some big news for you: In just a couple of weeks, we’re launching 

If you're already a subscriber to City Cast DC, you will 

Obsessed is Kaela Cote-Stemmermann’s newsletter on food and culture. 

If you’ve been reading our daily newsletter (now being authored by our executive editor and podcast co-host Michael Schaffer), then you probably love Kaela’s signature smarts and humor. After writing a daily newsletter for four years, we wanted a place for Kaela’s writing about D.C. to truly shine. I’m so excited for her to now be fully immersed in what she loves: being your guide to the best food and events in the city.

In Kaela’s words, the newsletter is “an absolutely local, always fun, and totally honest weekly dispatch on D.C. food and culture.” It launches May 14. Follow her on 

is Emma Uber’s weekly newsletter on the stories that everyone in Washington is talking about. 

She’ll take you deeper into the scandals, disputes and delights of life in the District, touching on subjects both light and serious.

Emma joined City Cast from the Washington Post and says she’s thrilled to be part of a newsroom investing in local news. “As soon as I met the City Cast team, it became clear they love D.C. and care deeply about the people who live here,” she says. “I can't wait to work with them to bring D.C.'s must-read stories to your inbox."

Her newsletter starts May 20. Follow her on 

When City Cast DC launched its daily podcast and newsletter back in 2022, the goal was simple: help D.C. residents stay connected to their city and become better neighbors. That hasn't changed. But now, we’ll also bring you essential original reporting you can’t get anywhere else.

This expansion isn’t possible without community support. 

We need more Neighbors to make this work long term.

Become a neighbor

Being a Neighbor isn’t just for feeling good about supporting local news, though. Neighbors get exclusive perks and this week only, a free welcome gift. The choice between 

 to declare your love for D.C. and the people who live here.

I hope you sign up for our newsletters and consider becoming a member. Thanks for your support.

Sign up now to get the big stories Washington is talking about and our can't-miss guide to food and culture. 

We're launching two new newsletters

,” director Eli Bauman stood before the audience and instructed them to pretend they had never heard of the Strait of Hormuz. Instead, he asked them to go back to 2008, when HOT 99.5 was pumping out Katy Perry and D.C. felt on the brink of political change.

”The truth of the matter is this show, which happens to be about politics, actually feels like an escape, " says Bauman.

“44” tells the story of the Obama presidency from the perspective of a go-lucky Biden, wistfully observing the trials of Barack (played by T.J. Wilkins) and Michelle (played by Shanice Wilson-Knox) as they navigate their life in the White House

 Written and directed by Bauman, a TV writer and former Obama campaign organizer, it’s a “Hamilton-esq” wet liberal fantasy that had the entire crowd singing “He’s motherfucking Obama” while they fondly reminisced about a bygone era.

Since premiering in L.A. in 2022, the show has been bouncing from city to city in a four-year quest to make itself Broadway-ready. Now, it’s playing at the Shakespeare Theater in D.C. until May 10.

Bauman said that D.C. has been their favorite crowd so far and the shows have consistently been sold out on Fridays and Saturdays.

“There's just a certain level of knowledge [in D.C.] that makes everything land,” said Bauman, “I feel like they've picked up the most on the nuance-y stuff, and also I feel like they could really use a laugh.”

I can’t imagine a more fitting or enthusiastic crowd than the one that filled the Shakespeare Theater last Thursday night. The show’s two hours were packed with Motown grooves, Sarah Palin scream-singing “drill me baby!” in her bra, and jokes that only the most entrenched 2008 hill staffers could decipher. I must admit, even I had a hard time keeping it together when Hilary Clinton whipped off her pantsuit to reveal…another pantsuit.

The audience's frenzy reached its peak when Biden started dancing awkwardly to gogo — a song added specifically for the show’s D.C. run. It was almost as painful as watching Justin Timberlake's 

. (Though, some semblance of self-awareness made it more endearing.)

It was an unabashed love-letter to the Obamas. Though, unfortunately, despite the actors’ great performances, the ungainly reverence given to the first couple makes their scenes some of the most boring in the whole show. Especially when compared to the outrageous but poignant satirical treatment given to Hillary Clinton, Mitch McConnell, and the show's other front-runners.

Bauman first had the idea to write “44” the day after Donald Trump was first elected president. Like many people, he found himself grappling with the question of “what the hell happened?”

”This felt like my attempt at reconciling that question,“ he explained.

It wasn’t until Covid that Bauman said the changes started to become relevant to him personally, pushing him to put pen to paper.

”During COVID it felt more and more relevant to me. And I just had time all of a sudden to do something that, quite frankly, would make no money.”

He never expected it to take off, but said that luck and a few key early decisions set the show up for success.

“There's no Trump in it, and our Biden is 45 years old and has a six pack,” explained Bauman. “Those two decisions made the show somewhat Teflon to the chaos going around.”

This raunchy love letter to 2008 D.C. by a former Obama campaign staffer left us weeping with laughter and nostalgia. 

'44: The Musical' returns Washingtonians to an old, hopeful DC

The Obama musical returns Washingtonians to an old, hopeful DC

How closely did you pay attention to local news this year?

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DC 2025 Year In Review News Quiz

Kaela Cote-Stemmermann

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