About The WV WASP

The West Virginia WASP is an independent West Virginia political publication focused on the stories behind the stories.

We cover state government, the Legislature, campaigns, political personalities, policy fights, and the decisions that shape life in the Mountain State.

But we don’t simply want to tell you what happened.

We want to tell you what’s really going on.

That means digging beyond press releases and public statements, talking to people close to the action, examining documents and public records, following the money and the politics, and finding the details that often get left out of the public version of the story.

Sometimes the most important part of a story is what happened before the announcement. Sometimes it’s the document sitting in a file that nobody bothered to read.

That’s where The WASP comes in.

Journalism With An Inside View

The WASP believes West Virginians deserve political reporting that takes them seriously.

We pursue original reporting, deep sourcing, public records, documents, interviews, tips, and people with firsthand knowledge.

We won’t pretend to know something we don’t know. We won’t present speculation as fact. And when a claim doesn’t hold up, we’ll say so.

Do the reporting. Show the reader what we found. Let the reader think.

The WASP operates from a conservative perspective, but accuracy and responsible sourcing come before ideology.

Good journalism doesn’t tell you what to think. It gives you what you need to think for yourself.

Serious About News. Not Afraid To Have Fun.

Politics can be serious business. It can also be absurd.

That’s why The WASP makes room for commentary, humor, and political satire.

Our satire is intentionally separate from our reporting. When we’re reporting news, we’re reporting news. When we’re making fun of politics, we’re making fun of politics.

We think readers are smart enough to appreciate both.

For the fun side of politics, follow @wvwasp on X.

Why Subscribe?

The WASP is built around original reporting you won’t necessarily find elsewhere.

Paid subscribers get full access to our investigations, Deep Reads, archives, and subscriber-only material, along with stories and information that may appear here before they reach the wider public.

Some stories begin with a tip. Some begin with a document. Some begin with a conversation.

And sometimes they begin with somebody telling us:

“You need to look into this.”

We’re listening.

Have Something We Should Know?

Have a tip, document, story idea, correction, or information about something happening in West Virginia politics?

Send it to waspwv@proton.me.

Correspondence will remain confidential unless you specifically want to be identified or want to publish something under your name.

If something important is happening in West Virginia, The WASP wants to know about it.

Advertising

Interested in reaching well-connected West Virginia consumers and voters?

Contact us at waspwv@proton.me to discuss advertising with The WASP. For more on advertising with us, visit this page.

If we publish something that's factually wrong, we'll correct it and note the correction publicly. We don't present speculation as fact.

Why subscribe?

Subscribe to get full access to all our material and publication archives.