Cameron Stewart leads Quills nominees for US work

The Australian’s Washington correspondent has been nominated for Australia’s richest journalism prize.

Cameron Stewart.

The Australian’s Washington correspondent has been nominated for Australia’s richest journalism prize.

Cameron Stewart leads a raft of nominees from this newspaper at the Melbourne Press Club’s annual Quills awards. He is up for the $20,000 Graham Perkin journalist of the year award for his coverage of US politics and society.

As Washington correspondent he has reported on everything from the first days of the Trump administration to the death of Australian woman Justine Ruszczyk at the hands of US police.

Stewart was also nominated for sport feature of the year for his The Weekend Australian Magazine profile of legendary Australian golfer Greg Norman.

The Australian’s Will Swanton is one of three nominees for sports journalist of the year.

Victorian business editor Damon Kitney is nominated for best business feature for his TWAM profile of Crown Resorts tycoon James Packer. Kitney is working on Mr Packer’s biography.

Ben Butler of this newspaper’s Melbourne bureau is nominated for best business news report for his “ASIC files” series that revealed the corporate watchdog had allowed the big banks to alter press releases about their misconduct for a decade.

Other nominees for the Graham Perkin award include Fairfax’s Adele Ferguson for her investigations into the retirement sector, the ABC’s Sally Sara for her African coverage including the fall of Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe, and The Age’s Nick McKenzie and Richard Baker for their reporting on Chinese influence in Australian politics.

The winners will be announced at Melbourne’s Crown Palladium on March 16.