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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NPR’s Pien Huang weighs in on RFK Jr.’s skepticism of conventional public health expertise and his recommendation to remove fluoride from the drinking water.
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NPR talks to Republican strategist Ron Bonjean about Trump's election success. Bonjean held top communications and strategy positions in the House and Senate.
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NPR talks with Democratic Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Texas about his role in promoting Vice President Harris to the top of the Democrats' presidential ticket.
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NPR's Steve Inskeep talks to cybersecurity expert Chris Krebs about the integrity of the 2024 election. Krebs was fired by President Trump after he vouched for the integrity of the 2020 election.
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Center-right pollster Christine Matthews with Bellwether Research & Consulting discusses the election results.
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NPR speaks with Johns Hopkins professor and Russia expert Sergey Radchenko about Donald Trump's foreign policy approach.
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Former President Donald Trump has been elected president again, according to a race call by the AP. Meanwhile, Republicans have taken control of the Senate, while the House remains too close to call.
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NPR talks with Democratic pollster Margie Omero about the election outcomes in swing states, where polls indicated toss-up races.
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Former President Donald Trump has expressed his strong support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. We hear from Israelis about his return to the White House.
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NPR's Steve Inskeep talks to GOP pollster BJ Martino, president and CEO of the Tarrance Group, about what demographic has surprised him the most in the presidential election -- based on exit polls.