In 1987, White joined the Detroit bureau of The Wall Street Journal, and became the bureau chief in 1990.[1][2] White and Detroit bureau chief Paul Ingrassia earned the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for Beat Reporting "for often exclusive coverage of General Motors' management turmoil."[1][3] Their reporting also earned a 1993 Gerald Loeb Award for "Deadline and/or Beat Writing",[4][5][2] and they turned it into a book, "Comeback: The Fall and Rise of the American Automobile Industry," in 1994.[1]
White moved to Brussels in 1994 to become the news editor and chief of correspondents for The Wall Street Journal Europe.[1] He returned the Detroit bureau in 1996 as a news editor covering Columbia-HCA Healthcare and auto industry management issues, and again became the bureau chief in 1998.[1] He worked in the Washington, D.C. bureau from 2008 to 2011 covering business regulation and energy policy, and then returned to Detroit to become the Global Auto Editor.[1]