Steve Inskeep
Steve Inskeep is a host of NPR's Morning Edition, as well as NPR's morning news podcast Up First.
Known for interviews with presidents and Congressional leaders, Inskeep has a passion for stories of the less famous: Pennsylvania truck drivers, Kentucky coal miners, U.S.-Mexico border detainees, Yemeni refugees, California firefighters, American soldiers.
Since joining Morning Edition in 2004, Inskeep has hosted the program from New Orleans, Detroit, San Francisco, Cairo, and Beijing; investigated Iraqi police in Baghdad; and received a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for "The Price of African Oil," on conflict in Nigeria. He has taken listeners on a 2,428-mile journey along the U.S.-Mexico border, and 2,700 miles across North Africa. He is a repeat visitor to Iran and has covered wars in Syria and Yemen.
Inskeep says Morning Edition works to "slow down the news," making sense of fast-moving events. A prime example came during the 2008 Presidential campaign, when Inskeep and NPR's Michele Norris conducted "The York Project," groundbreaking conversations about race, which received an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton for excellence.
Inskeep was hired by NPR in 1996. His first full-time assignment was the 1996 presidential primary in New Hampshire. He went on to cover the Pentagon, the Senate, and the 2000 presidential campaign of George W. Bush. After the Sept. 11 attacks, he covered the war in Afghanistan, turmoil in Pakistan, and the war in Iraq. In 2003, he received a National Headliner Award for investigating a military raid gone wrong in Afghanistan. He has twice been part of NPR News teams awarded the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton for coverage of Iraq.
On days of bad news, Inskeep is inspired by the Langston Hughes book, Laughing to Keep From Crying. Of hosting Morning Edition during the 2008 financial crisis and Great Recession, he told Nuvo magazine when "the whole world seemed to be falling apart, it was especially important for me ... to be amused, even if I had to be cynically amused, about the things that were going wrong. Laughter is a sign that you're not defeated."
Inskeep is the author of Instant City: Life and Death in Karachi, a 2011 book on one of the world's great megacities. He is also author of Jacksonland, a history of President Andrew Jackson's long-running conflict with John Ross, a Cherokee chief who resisted the removal of Indians from the eastern United States in the 1830s.
He has been a guest on numerous TV programs including ABC's This Week, NBC's Meet the Press, MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell Reports, CNN's Inside Politics and the PBS Newshour. He has written for publications including The New York Times, Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and The Atlantic.
A native of Carmel, Indiana, Inskeep is a graduate of Morehead State University in Kentucky.
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After delays, Republicans roll out a pandemic relief bill. MLB postpones three games after a coronavirus outbreak. And the pandemic is overwhelming public health capacity in many states.
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News Brief: COVID-19 Relief Plan, Portland Protests, Remembering John LewisRepublicans will unveil the latest version of a coronavirus relief package. Protests continue in Portland, Ore. And, the body of Rep. John Lewis will lie in state at the U.S. Capitol in Washington.
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Shannon LaNier is the sixth great-grandson of Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings. He talks to NPR about the founding father's complicated history, and how that should be reflected in his memorial. -
The UK government has decided that British telecom companies can no longer buy equipment from Huawei, the controversial Chinese telecom giant, for development of 5G beginning next year.
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COVID-19 surge forces California to slow reopening. U.S. court hearing may decide the fate of more than a million international students. And, South China Sea becomes a dangerous military flashpoint.
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News Brief: COVID-19 Cases Surge, CDC's Black Employees, Breonna Taylor CaseFlorida breaks record for new COVID-19 cases. Why is COVID-19 hitting people of color harder in the U.S.? Four months ago, Louisville police shot and killed Breonna Taylor in her apartment.
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Texas requires masks in counties with more than 20 COVID-19 cases. California orders 19 counties to shut down. And, a British socialite is charged in connection with the Jeffrey Epstein abuse case.
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NPR analyzes COVID-19 testing with Harvard researchers. Did the president know Russia was offering to pay Afghan militants to kill U.S. troops? And, China enacts law asserting control over Hong Kong.
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NPR's Steve Inskeep talks to Mississippi state Sen. Derrick Simmons, a Democrat, after lawmakers in that state voted on Sunday to remove the Confederate battle emblem from the state flag. -
Coronavirus curve trends upward as cases surge. Reports indicate Russia paid Taliban-linked militias to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan. And, critics say Trump fuels racism for political purposes.
