Arit John joins The Times’ Washington Bureau as national political correspondent

The following announcement was sent on behalf of Washington Bureau Chief Kimbriell Kelly:

Arit John has joined the Los Angeles Times Washington Bureau as national political correspondent, a role she has been serving in temporarily since November.

She started at The Times in February 2020 to write about the presidential campaign, then spent a year with the Lifestyle section. Previously, she covered politics and entertainment for the Atlantic, the 2016 election cycle and Congress for Bloomberg News and did a brief stint with the New York Times Style section, where she wrote stories about weed churches, TikTok stars and culture in Los Angeles.

A native Southern Californian, John brings to the role a clear voice for the West Coast and an outside-the-Beltway view of national politics. During the 2020 election cycle, she wrote about how the pandemic forced states to quickly adopt absentee and mail voting and the backlash that followed. After joining the Lifestyle desk, she explored the intersection between culture and politics, exploring how “Are you vaccinated?” replaced “Who did you vote for in 2020?” as the way single people in L.A. screened potential dates.

In her new position, John will focus on the issues and people shaping our national political conversation and the impact the political debates in Washington have on the lives of Californians and people across the nation.

Since returning to Washington, she’s examined the dynamics of race and the complex experiences of Black women watching Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Senate confirmation hearing, reported how secretaries of state have evolved from obscure bureaucrats to the frontline leaders in the battle to protect the nation’s elections and created a timeline of the shifting reactions to the Jan. 6 revolt from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy.

She began her role March 7.