A Substack Creator Got a Capitol Hill Press Credential, Paving the Way for Others

Michael Jones spent about a year convincing the journalists who control access to Capitol Hill that his one-person Substack publication was, in fact, a real news organization.

Eventually, they agreed.

Jones became the first journalist/creator publishing on Substack to receive a Capitol Hill press credential back in 2022, giving him the same kind of access to lawmakers and congressional workspaces available to reporters from traditional news organizations.

Since then, a handful of other Substack creators have followed him.

Jones runs Once Upon a Hill, a one-person political publication supported in part by subscribers paying $15 a month or $150 a year. He has divided his audience into free readers who follow politics closely and paying political professionals who, as Jones puts it, “can’t afford to get Congress wrong.”

He doesn’t disclose subscriber or revenue figures, but said the publication generates enough money to support him. He eventually wants to expand that one-person operation into something resembling a small newsroom, hiring an editor and reporters who can produce more original journalism.

“Having original reporting, getting exclusives, getting scoops—that’s what generates paid subscriptions,” Jones said.

It’s another sign of the growth, strength and power creators have. They don’t necessarily need the infrastructure of an established publisher to build a viable publication, but they do need the reporting access, product discipline and differentiated information that traditionally came with one.

The Press Credential Was a Business Problem

Jones came to independent publishing after being laid off from magazines four times in six years. He launched his first Substack publication, Supercreator, after discovering the platform in 2019. It focused on the intersection of politics, business and the creative economy.

Eventually, that beat brought Jones to Washington, where he began asking lawmakers questions about issues affecting creative workers. The immediate problem was access.

Without congressional credentials, Jones largely depended on emails and congressional aides to reach lawmakers. Responses could take a day or more, causing him to miss deadlines.

So Jones applied for credentials through the U.S. House Periodical Press Gallery. The process took roughly a year and required scrutiny of the publication’s ownership, finances, business model and potential industry conflicts.

“We look at how the organization is structured first, as opposed to the individuals,” said Jay Rupert, deputy director of the House Periodical Press Gallery. That distinction matters for independent publishers.

Jones wasn’t awarded the credential because he had amassed some enormous social following or become a prominent creator. His publishing operation had to meet standards designed to establish that it was an independent journalistic organization.

Michael Hardaway, a former aide to House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and President Barack Obama, has worked with reporters throughout his career. He said Jones stood out.

“He wanted to do his own thing, and he was getting it right,” Hardaway said.

After the Congressional credentialing committee approved Jones’ press pass, others followed.

“Since him, we have had, I don’t know the exact number, but a handful of other creators on Substack that follow the rules and follow the guidelines for what the credentialing process is, and they’ve all been a welcome addition to the gallery,” Rupert said.

For Jones, the payoff was immediate. Instead of waiting for email responses, he could encounter lawmakers in hallways, elevators and other parts of the Capitol and report more quickly. That access helped Jones get the kind of scoops that readers are willing to pay for.

In March he broke a story that the House Oversight Committee Republicans were holding informal roundtables instead of official hearings to avoid votes.

Another scoop came more recently, when he asked Senate Majority Leader John Thune about legislative priorities he wanted to tackle ahead of the August recess.

The senator replied, “It’s kind of a train wreck, isn’t it?” Several other media outlets then picked up the line, Jones said.

Building the Funnel

Jones has spent years tinkering with the business around that reporting.

Once Upon a Hill effectively has two products for two audiences, political obsessives—the free readers who want to closely follow Congress—and political professionals who pay because the information is directly relevant to their work.

His publishing schedule is designed around moving readers from the first group into the second.

Jones publishes a free flagship newsletter every Sunday. He considers it his primary subscriber-acquisition product and a showcase for the paid publication. Monday through Thursday, he publishes a daily edition available to the full list but reserves portions for paying subscribers.

Each newsletter is structured more like a magazine than a conventional email blast, with a lead story followed by recurring sections covering power and leadership, policy, and campaigns and elections. Free readers encounter previews throughout the edition encouraging them to upgrade.

Paid subscribers also receive the archive, access to comments and the ability to message Jones directly. Jones uses those conversations as an editorial feedback loop, asking subscribers what they are confused about and what they want to understand better.

He doesn’t publish on Fridays. Instead, he uses those days to review analytics, plan the following week, talk with sources and think about his Sunday lead. It’s one of the realities of a one-person media company: the reporter, editor, audience development and publisher are all the same person.

From Creator to Publisher

With Supercreator, Jones focused specifically on the creative economy. That positioning eventually became a liability.

When Jones approached members of Congress and introduced himself as a reporter from Supercreator, he often had to first explain what a creator was. By the time he finished explaining the beat, he sometimes hadn’t gotten to the question he wanted to ask.

So in 2023, he broadened the product and renamed it Once Upon a Hill.

The publication now approaches Congress through narrative political reporting rather than exclusively through the creator economy. That evolution also captures something happening to a growing number of independent media businesses.

They may start around the identity and interests of an individual creator, but building a durable subscription product can require something more recognizable: a clear audience, a defined editorial proposition, repeatable publishing formats and reporting readers can’t easily get elsewhere.

Philip Lewis, an editor with HuffPost and president of the Washington Association of Black Journalists, has followed Jones from Supercreator to Once Upon a Hill.

He admires Jones and his work, especially his reporting on the Congressional Black Caucus.

“Journalists like Michael are really crucial for telling stories that are probably underreported,” Lewis said. “I still feel like I’m at the very beginning of this journey,” he said.

That would turn Once Upon a Hill from a journalist with a newsletter into a small news organization. For Jones, the shrinking of traditional newsrooms makes building those businesses increasingly important.

“The future of journalism demands we figure out what to do with the professionals whose byline people may not be familiar with, but whose journalism is indispensable,” he said.

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