E. Tammy Kim, Freelance Journalist Profile

Articles

Creature of the Late Afternoon | E. Tammy Kim

2 weeks ago | nplusonemag.com | E. Tammy Kim

A few years ago, my mom’s brother in South Korea, the oldest son, announced that he would be getting rid of their parents’ graves. My grandparents had been buried separately, in far-flung cemeteries, and this uncle and his wife were their keepers. They made several annual visits to the burial mounds (endless gridlock) and prepared Buddhist ceremonies at home (endless cooking and cleaning).
Cut Right Through the Boat and Illuminate Everything

4 weeks ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

The Singaporean photographer who goes by the single name Nguan has often felt the same way. He was living in SoHo after college, intending to be a filmmaker, when 9/11 happened. Outside his apartment, on Sullivan Street, he used an early Canon digital camera to document what he saw. “My photographs were really bad,” he told me. “But when I wanted to tell people about that day, nothing I wrote or talked about could convey that reality better.” This was what led him to photography.
How Unions Can Protect Immigrants

1 month ago | dissentmagazine.org | Patrick Iber |Natasha Lewis |Michael Kazin |E. Tammy Kim

How Unions Can Protect Immigrants An Interview With Faye Guenther, president of UFCW Local 3000. and &squarf; Spring 2025 In February the labor reporter Luis Feliz Leon published an essay on the n+1 website on unions’ varying responses to Trump.
Trump Threatens NPR and PBS

1 month ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

“Journalists’ work is under fire.” Donald Trump is yanking federal funds from public media. Leaders at NPR-affiliate stations around the country explain why this attack feels different, and what the consequences of defunding would be. Plus:• The Trump deportees turned “ghosts” in the U.S. legal system• Jelani Cobb on Ryan Coogler’s road to “Sinners”• A joyfully chaotic new movie about the indie-rock band PavementE. Tammy KimKim writes about politics and the federal workforce.
Turbulence at the Airport

1 month ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

When Juan joined the Transportation Security Administration, or T.S.A., about seven years ago, he wasn’t sure how long he could afford to stay. He was assigned to staff the screening checkpoint and inspect bags at Palm Springs International Airport, an indoor-outdoor facility at the foot of the San Jacinto Mountains, a few hours’ drive east of Los Angeles.
What “America First” Could Cost Us

1 month ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

In late February, the Office of Management and Budget instructed all federal entities to align themselves with “the President’s America First foreign policy.” It required agencies and private institutions that receive government grants to conduct a kind of self-audit, to weed out foreign programs that do not promote “American prosperity by advancing capitalism, markets that favor Americans, competition for American partnership, and economic self-reliance.” There would be no more “global...
A Weird Tax Season at the I.R.S.

1 month ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

It’s Tax Day, again. Our columnist goes inside the short-staffed I.R.S. to investigate its employees’ struggles—and the precarious future of the agency. Plus:• Revisiting the epicenter of the COVID pandemic• Trump eyes a minerals deal with the Democratic Republic of the CongoE. Tammy KimKim writes about politics, labor, and the federal government.
The Plight of the Taxman

1 month ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

The I.R.S. office in Philadelphia is situated in a grand, Art Deco-style federal building across from Thirtieth Street Station, along the Schuylkill River. Before President Donald Trump started his second term, the office employed around five thousand workers. Mike swiped through security, bought a coffee at the snack shop, and took the elevator up to his floor of padded cubicles.
“I Am Seeing My Community of Researchers Decimated”

1 month ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

A few days into Donald Trump’s second term, Emily Williams, a public-health professor at the University of Washington, e-mailed a program officer at the National Institutes of Health, a division of the Health and Human Services Department. “I wanted to touch base with you in light of several recent Federal Executive Orders,” she wrote.
A Win for Democracy in South Korea

2 months ago | newyorker.com | E. Tammy Kim

South Korea’s Constitutional Court upheld the impeachment of the country’s President, removing him from office. E. Tammy Kim, who covered Yoon Suk-yeol’s brief declaration of martial law, in December, and the protests that followed, reflects on the challenges to democracy in Korea and the United States. Also in today’s newsletter:• Susan B. Glasser on how Trump melted the global economyE. Tammy KimKim writes about politics, the federal government, and the Koreas.