Michael Morisy (Knight Fellow)

Michael Morisy is MuckRock’s chief executive and co-founder. Since MuckRock’s launch, he has grown it to be the United States pre-eminent digital public records and government transparency resource, helping file over 100,000 requests through its platform and reaching millions of readers each year with its public records resources, including request templates, training, guides, and original reporting on the state of access to information. He has also led the organization through a series of acquisitions and mergers, including with DocumentCloud, oTranscribe, and FOIA Machine. In total, its services are in use by over 70,000 registered users across 4,000 newsrooms, and reach over 14 million unique readers each month. He was previously an editor at the Boston Globe, where he launched the paper’s technology vertical covering startups and innovation in the New England region. In addition to his work on MuckRock, he serves on the boards of the American Society of Access Professionals and the National Freedom of Information Coalition. He has also served two terms on the federal FOIA Advisory Committee, which researches and proposes reforms to improve the operations of the federal Freedom of Information Act. He is currently a 2018-19 nonresidential fellow at Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri. He was a 2014-15 John S. Knight Journalism Fellow at Stanford University and a 2012-13 Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics Network Fellow at Harvard University. He graduated in 2007 from Cornell University with a degree in English.