Melanie Schmitz is a journalist currently serving as the managing editor of The American Independent. She previously served as senior politics editor at ThinkProgress in Washington, D.C. Her work has been featured across a number of outlets over the years, including Bustle, Den of Geek magazine, xoJane, Opposing Views, and the independent publisher Quirk Books.

Melanie worked as a political reporter and news editor at Bustle Digital Group in New York for several years and served as the editorial director for an international nonprofit. She has reported on a variety of issues, including the 2014 West Africa Ebola outbreak and the ongoing outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the war in Syria, conflicts in Nigeria and Sudan, the GOP tax bill, the family separation crisis, and the 2016 election and transition. She has also reported extensively on the Russia investigation and Trump impeachment inquiry.

In 2015, she published a feature on Nicaragua’s evolving education initiatives, how government-led campaigns affected literacy and jobs, and the fallout from Iran-Contra. The project was the result of a week on the ground in places like Managua and San Juan del Sur, which later led to additional reporting in 2018 on the violent clashes between protesters and police across the country.

Melanie has a background in Middle Eastern studies and Journalism from Brigham Young University and worked on the 2008 Senate run-off election in Georgia.