Evan Vucci, Pulitzer-Winning AP Photographer, to Leave His DC Post
Evan Vucci, chief photographer for the Associated Press in Washington, D.C., is set to leave the news agency after 23 years working there.
Update 2/11: It’s since been announced that Vucci will join Reuters, remaining in D.C.
Since 2003, Vucci has been working as a news photographer for the AP. In 2008, he spent time embedded with American soldiers in Mosul, Iraq, who were stationed at a deadly outpost. While in Iraq, Vucci captured a well-known photo of journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi throwing a shoe at then U.S. President George W. Bush.
Vucci was part of the AP team that won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography for their work documenting the aftermath of the George Floyd murder. In 2024, Vucci was widely praised for his photograph of Donald Trump moments after an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania. The image of Trump’s raised fist with blood splatter on his face and the American flag in the background caused a sensation. It was put on the front cover of Time magazine and Trump even had a painting commissioned of it.
Vucci’s departure from AP was reported in the AP Connecting newsletter, edited by Paul Stevens. “He is one of those people who needs only one name: Vucci. Whether you are in a journalists’ scrum, on a seat on Air Force One, at a protest, or a pool van, when anyone says Vucci, everyone knows exactly who you are talking about,” a note circulated to AP Washington bureau staff reads, per Connecting.
“Evan is a full tool kit journalist. Intrepid. Fearless. Careful. Kind. Compassionate. Driven. He uses all of his senses — his eyes, his ears, his reflexes — to deliver impactful images that soon rocket around the globe because of their visual impact.”
Since Trump resumed office last year, the AP has found itself in the president’s crosshairs. After the organization was banned from the White House for refusing to change its house style from Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America, Vucci testified on the agency’s behalf calling Associated Press photographers “the gold standard”.
The Trump administration relented and AP photographers have since been allowed back in the White House Press Corps but reporters have not been extended the same welcome. It has meant AP photographers have had to bear witness and report back the best they can. In one remarkable episode, Vucci captured the contents of a note passed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio to Trump during a roundtable event at the White House informing the president that a peace deal in the Middle East was “very close”.
“To say that he [Vucci] will be missed in our bureau and at AP understates the void that he leaves,” the staff note adds.
