Michel Martin Michel Martin is a host of Morning Edition.
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Michel Martin

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Michel Martin - 2014
Steve Voss/NPR

Michel Martin

Host, Morning Edition

Michel Martin is a host of Morning Edition. Previously, she was the weekend host of All Things Considered and host of the Consider This Saturday podcast, where she drew on her deep reporting and interviewing experience to dig in to the week's news. Outside the studio, she has also hosted "Michel Martin: Going There," an ambitious live event series in collaboration with Member stations.

Martin came to NPR in 2006 and launched Tell Me More, a one-hour daily NPR news and talk show that aired on NPR stations nationwide from 2007-2014 and dipped into thousands of important conversations taking place in the corridors of power, but also in houses of worship, and barber shops and beauty shops, at PTA meetings, town halls, and at the kitchen table.

She has spent more than 25 years as a journalist — first in print with major newspapers and then in television. Tell Me More marked her debut as a full-time public radio show host. Martin says, "What makes public radio special is that it's got both intimacy and reach all at once. For the cost of a phone call, I can take you around the world. But I'm right there with you in your car, in your living room or kitchen or office, in your iPod. Radio itself is an incredible tool and when you combine that with the global resources of NPR plus the commitment to quality, responsibility and civility, it's an unbeatable combination."

Martin has also served as contributor and substitute host for NPR newsmagazines and talk shows, including Talk of the Nation and News & Notes.

Martin joined NPR from ABC News, where she worked since 1992. She served as correspondent for Nightline from 1996 to 2006, reporting on such subjects as the congressional budget battles, the U.S. embassy bombings in Africa, racial profiling and the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. At ABC, she also contributed to numerous programs and specials, including the network's award-winning coverage of Sept. 11, a documentary on the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas controversy, a critically acclaimed AIDS special and reports for the ongoing series "America in Black and White." Martin reported for the ABC newsmagazine Day One, winning an Emmy for her coverage of the international campaign to ban the use of landmines, and was a regular panelist on This Week with George Stephanopoulos. She also hosted the 13-episode series Life 360, an innovative program partnership between Oregon Public Broadcasting and Nightline incorporating documentary film, performance and personal narrative; it aired on public television stations across the country.

Before joining ABC, Martin covered state and local politics for the Washington Post and national politics and policy at the Wall Street Journal, where she was White House correspondent. She has also been a regular panelist on the PBS series Washington Week and a contributor to NOW with Bill Moyers.

Martin has been honored by numerous organizations, including the Candace Award for Communications from The National Coalition of 100 Black Women, the Joan Barone Award for Excellence in Washington-based National Affairs/Public Policy Broadcasting from the Radio and Television Correspondents' Association and a 2002 Silver Gavel Award, given by the American Bar Association. Along with her Emmy award, she received three additional Emmy nominations, including one with WNYC's Robert Krulwich, at the time an ABC contributor as well, for an ABC News program examining children's racial attitudes. In 2019, Martin was elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences for outstanding achievement in journalism. She is the 2021 recipient of PMJA's 2021 Leo C. Lee Award.

A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., Martin graduated cum laude from Radcliffe College at Harvard University in 1980 and earned a Master of Arts from the Wesley Theological Seminary in 2016.

Story Archive

Monday

Federal student loan borrowers prepare to resume repaying their loans

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Tuesday

Morning news brief

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DOJ's antitrust trial against Google over its search dominance is set to begin

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Monday

A rare chance to look into Nicaragua, a country that shuts itself off to journalists

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Morning news brief

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Saturday

Chad is struggling to accommodate the over 400,000 refugees from Sudan

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Thursday

A team from NPR's Morning Edition visited makeshift refugee homes in Camp Adré, Chad, near the border with Sudan. HJ Mai/NPR hide caption

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Sudanese refugees in Chad scramble to survive

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Wednesday

On the ground in Chad, where Sudanese refugees have been fleeing

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Friday

Settlement talks are faltering in the Sept. 11 terrorism case

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Morning news brief

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Thursday

A catastrophic fire in South Africa has taken the lives of dozens of people

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Wednesday

Hurricane Idalia is already causing flooding along Florida's Gulf Coast

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In Spain, there's a reckoning over sexism and women's sports

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Tuesday

There has been a lot of extreme weather lately. What's the cause?

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Morning news brief

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Group of emerging countries begins a closely watched summit

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Monday

Morning news brief

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Friday

OpenAI is facing lawsuits over copyrighted materials it uses to train ChatGPT

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Rhiannon Giddens performs at 'A New York Evening With Rhiannon Giddens' at National Sawdust on August 17, 2023 in New York City. In this interview with NPR's Michel Martin, she reflects on her new album and more. Rob Kim/Getty Images for The Recording A hide caption

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Rhiannon Giddens is searching for a 'little bit of joy to bounce into'

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Thursday

Federal appeals court ruling deals a blow to access to abortion pill mifepristone

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Some residents of west Maui are able to go back to their communities

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