New York Post’s Caitlin Doornbos wins award for Ukraine reporting

Caitlin Doornbos, a Washington correspondent at the New York Post, won a prestigious journalism award Tuesday night for a series of riveting stories she wrote while bravely embedding with troops in war-torn Ukraine last year.

Doornbos’ fearless coverage — which included dispatches from the battlefield along with a secret weapons repair base — earned her the Newswomen’s Club of New York’s Marie Colvin Award for Foreign Correspondence.

She and other award recipients were feted at an elegant reception at Manhattan’s New York Athletic Club Tuesday night.

“What I could do from the Pentagon was only so much. I had to go to the scene to show our readers here in New York why this is a fight for democracy, this is a fight for the free world,” Doornbos, 32, said in an impassioned acceptance speech.

“This is not just something we can throw money at and it will go away. This is something we must care for.”

In February 2024, Doornbos revealed how desperate Ukrainians were forced to repurpose billion-dollar weapons from the “trash” as Congress haggled over aid two years after Russia first invaded the country.

In another piece, she faced the “gritty reality of war” as Russian jets roared overhead — and a frontline soldier told her, “Our freedom is worth dying for.”

Before taking home the award Tuesday, Doornbos — who was dressed to the nines in a flowing pink gown — thanked her mom in the audience for being “in her corner.”

She then praised The Post, including editor-in-chief Keith Poole and politics editor Sam Chamberlain, for taking a chance on an ambitious young scribe from the Midwest.

“[The Post] believed in this blonde tabloid reporter from Kansas to go out and show the world that I know what I’m talking about— and that I know Ukraine is worth fighting for,” she said.

She later added, “The Post elevated the role of ‘tabloid journalism,’ exemplifying how we can both inform and be entertain you, while also holding the city, nation and world’s leaders accountable.”

“I’m so grateful to work for a news outlet that believes in the value of sending reporters to sometimes very dangerous places to help our readers understand how world events directly affect them,” she said.

Doornbos was among some of New York’s “most tireless and dedicated journalists,” honored for reporting on everything from sex trafficking to bad air quality and gun violence, the Newswomen’s Club said.

“As you write your stories, know that you are just as courageous as any person on the front line because you are doing what you do,” Doornbos told the audience of reporters and editors. “Because you think someone will care — and make a difference in this world.”

Journalists who won the award in other categories this year included Debra Kamin of The New York Times, who exposed abuses in the real estate world, and Somini Sengupta also of The New York Times, who has worked in more than 50 countries, including 10 conflict zones.

Before joining The Post, Doornbos reported from the Pentagon for the military paper Stars and Stripes and worked as a breaking news and crime reporter in Lawrence, Kansas, and Orlando, Fla.