Data Journalism Fellow

About the role

We are pleased to announce that Lawfare is hiring two early-career researchers to help develop and expand the use of RAGtime, our AI-enabled research platform for primary-source, democracy-sensitive public records.

Responsibilities

• Explore and document how RAGtime engages its existing datasets—federal litigation, statutes, regulations, Office of Legal Counsel opinions, and foreign-relations records—surfacing patterns, strengths, and gaps;
• Experiment with new datasets: help identify, evaluate, and onboard new corpora of public records, and assess how they expand what the platform can do;
• Develop use cases by working with senior editors and users to craft and refine the prompts and workflows that turn RAGtime into beneficial tools for research, reporting, and analysis;
• Conduct data journalism and research analysis using RAGtime—finding stories, evidence, and insight in the primary-source record and helping translate them into Lawfare’s published work;
• Serve as a thought partner to the editor-in-chief and to volunteer software developers on the platform’s roadmap and capabilities;
• Help keep current and new data pipelines up to date using AI-assisted (“vibe coding”) approaches—formal software-engineering experience is not required;
• Gather and synthesize feedback from users to inform improvements and new features;
• Contribute to platform documentation, user guidance, and, as needed, reporting on platform use for funders and stakeholders;
• Take on other responsibilities as the platform grows.

Qualifications

• Strong research, analytical, and writing skills—ideally with a background in journalism, data journalism, research, law, public policy, information science, or a related field;
• Comfort using AI and large language models in daily work, and enthusiasm for “vibe coding”—using AI tools to write lightweight code and scripts—even without a formal technical background;
• Curiosity and rigor: an eagerness to explore a new tool, form hypotheses about how it can be used, and test them;
• Comfort working with data—finding, evaluating, organizing, and drawing insight from structured and unstructured sources;
• An interest in law, government, national security, or the public record (a strong plus).

Benefits

• Salary is competitive and commensurate with experience within a range of $70,000-$90,000.
• Benefits include health and dental care (with premiums fully paid by Lawfare), flexible hours, and participation in Lawfare's 401(k) plan with up to 4% employer match.
• Funding for these positions beyond one year is contingent on fundraising.

How to apply

A resume showing the experience and education requested above;
A brief cover letter explaining your interest in the role and how your skills fit;
A writing, research, or data journalism sample;
Two references, with email addresses, of people directly familiar with your work.

The Pay Range For This Role Is 70,000 - 90,000 USD per year(Remote (Washington, DC, US))