2023 Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in TV Political Journalism, Winner - “Death Threats to Election Workers, We Called Them Back,” VICE News Tonight.
2023 NIHCM Television and Radio Journalism Award, Finalist- “VICE Investigates: Post Roe America,” VICE Special Reports.
2022 News & Documentary Emmy, Winner - Best News Coverage Longform, “Return of the Taliban,” VICE on Showtime.
2022 News & Documentary Emmy, Nomination - Outstanding News Coverage Short Form, ” Death Threats for Election Officials,” VICE News Tonight.
National Geographic Society - Young Explorers Program Grantee, 2014-2015. “Through the Prides” documentary series on human-lion conflict on the border of South Africa and Mozambique.
Madeleine May is an investigative reporter and producer for CBS News based in Washington, D.C.
Her work explores how online communities inform real-world political culture. She is a winner of multiple Emmy awards as well as a recipient of the Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in TV Political Journalism.
As an investigative reporter at CBS she was deeply embedded in the election integrity movement and the ongoing effort to discredit the elections process. More recently she dove into the Trump family’s finances through a multi-part series on the President’s crypto fortune. Her extended TV documentary on CBS Sunday Morning examined effort to undercut election security in the 2024 presidential race. As a Disarming Disinformation Fellow for ICFJ, her AI-driven investigation into Elon Musks’ election disinformation campaign on X was viewed by more than 4 million people. Madeleine’s reporting focuses on how online communities inform real-world political culture and how the ratcheting of extreme discourse leads to violence.
Over the last decade Madeleine covered threats to democracy and political extremism across the world, including reporting from elections in Hungary, Germany and the U.S. Before reporting from Washington D.C, she covered organized crime and illicit cross-border financial schemes in Eastern Europe. Her reporting showcased how governments and powerful people use disinformation campaigns to confuse, outrage, and make citizens cynical. As a reporter for VICE News, she covered misinformation and voting rights in the 2020 and 2022 elections. She is passionate about exposing levers of power and holding powerful people to account through accessible, character-driven storytelling.
Madeleine is a graduate of the Medill School at Northwestern University and a National Geographic Young Explorer. She is a recipient of the Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in TV Political Journalism for her work documenting threats to election workers. She is a two-time NATAS Emmy Award winner, and a Webby winner for best News & Politics series. In her free time, she competes in Muay Thai kickboxing and fixes the drywall in her house.
You can reach her at madeleinemay01(at)gmail.