A global news nonprofit wooed top foundations with exaggerated reach

Global Press Journal is, to read its marketing materials, among the most widely read publications in the United States. According to a 2021 survey conducted for the Global Press Institute, the nonprofit that operates it, Global Press Journal was the international news source of choice of 8% of Americans who regularly read international news, on par with The Guardian and The Economist. The nonprofit’s profile on one donor’s website until recently credited the outlet with 20 million monthly readers, and in a 2022 presentation to its board obtained by Semafor, Global Press said it had 98 million readers.

Global Press has an irresistibly compelling mission: replacing the “parachute” journalism of Western foreign correspondents with the authentic voices of local women from Mongolia to Zimbabwe, writing about their own countries. It grew out of its founder Cristi Hegranes’ revelation, while on a five-week trip to Nepal as a journalism student 20 years ago, that local women knew more than she did.