We are pleased to announce that Patrícia Campos Mello, Editor-at-Large and Columnist at Brazil’s Folha de São Paulo newspaper, has joined the MDIF Board of Directors. With a distinguished career in journalism, Patricia brings a range of valuable expertise to the Board, from international reporting to a deep understanding of electoral disinformation and technology.
Patricia has more than 25 years’ experience covering international relations, technology and human rights, and has reported from more than 50 countries. She was awarded the Columbia University Maria Moors Cabot award, the International Press Freedom Award of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). She has also won the Vladimir Herzog Special Award for Democracy and Justice, the Gabriel Garcia Marquez Excellence Award, the International Committee of the Red Cross Prize for humanitarian journalism and the King of Spain Journalism Prize. Patricia was awarded the Ordre National du Mérite in 2021 and the Ordem of Rio Branco in 2023.
Patricia has covered influence operations and tech regulation in Brazil, India and the US since 2014. Her investigative reporting led to changes in electoral law in Brazil. She is also the author of the bestselling book “A máquina do ódio ” (Companhia das Letras) about authoritarianism, disinformation and freedom of the press.
Patricia was the Washington correspondent for the Estado de S. Paulo newspaper between 2006 and 2010. She covered the economic crisis in the USA, and the elections in 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 and 2024. She also covered the 9/11 attacks in New York in 2001 and the war in Afghanistan in 2009. Patricia was the only Brazilian reporter to cover the Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone in 2014 and 2015, and covered the Covid pandemic in Brazil, reporting from public hospitals and shelters for homeless people.
More recently she spent time in Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, Libya, Turkey, Lebanon and Kenya reporting on conflict and refugees. In 2024, she covered the Israeli attacks against Lebanon and the fall of Assad in Syria. In 2025, she reported on the war in Ukraine from three frontlines in the east of the country.
Patricia was an associate researcher at Columbia University in 2021/2022, working on a project about internet regulation and electoral disinformation. She is the author of “Lua de Mel em Kobane”, a book about Syrian refugees who resisted the Islamic State siege in Kobane.
Patrícia has a degree in journalism from the University of São Paulo (USP) and a Master’s from New York University.