Brakkton Booker
Brakkton Booker is a National Desk reporter based in Washington, DC.
He covers a wide range of topics including issues related to federal social safety net programs and news around the mid-Atlantic region of the United States.
His reporting takes him across the country covering natural disasters, like hurricanes and flooding, as well as tracking trends in regional politics and in state governments, particularly on issues of race.
Following the 2018 mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, Booker's reporting broadened to include a focus on young activists pushing for changes to federal and state gun laws, including the March For Our Lives rally and national school walkouts.
Prior to joining NPR's national desk, Booker spent five years as a producer/reporter for NPR's political unit. He spent most to the 2016 presidential campaign cycle covering the contest for the GOP nomination and was the lead producer from the Trump campaign headquarters on election night. Booker served in a similar capacity from the Louisville campaign headquarters of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in 2014. During the 2012 presidential campaign, he produced pieces and filed dispatches from the Republican and Democratic National conventions, as well as from President Obama's reelection site in Chicago.
In the summer of 2014, Booker took a break from politics to report on the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri.
Booker started his career as a show producer working on nearly all of NPR's magazine programs, including Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and former news and talk show Tell Me More, where he produced the program's signature Barbershop segment.
He earned a bachelor's degree from Howard University and was a 2015 Kiplinger Fellow. When he's not on the road, Booker enjoys discovering new brands of whiskey and working on his golf game.
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George Washington grew cannabis. Not the kind you toke, but the kind to make rope. Industrial hemp was returned to Mount Vernon this year to help cultivate a new image for the crop. -
The 2012 GOP presidential nominee blasts Washington in an announcement video, saying, "Utah welcomes legal immigrants from around the world; Washington sends immigrants a message of exclusion." -
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analysts have been told to omit words such as "vulnerable," "transgender" and "evidence-based" from an upcoming budget. Critics say it amounts to censorship. -
The Vice President was in West Virginia a day after the GOP's Affordable Care Act repeal efforts were scrapped. He joked that maybe some WWE superstars were needed on Capitol Hill. -
Gregory Cheadle tells NPR he was not offended when presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump pointed to him at a recent California campaign rally and said, "Look at my African-American over here."
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New Hampshire has a reputation for strong voter participation and independents. It's easy to get on the ballot, and the state has had a better track record of picking GOP nominees in recent years. -
President Cecile Richards said accusations that the organization illegally profits from tissue provided to researchers have "nothing to do with our fetal tissue donation compliance process." -
California Gov. Jerry Brown: "I do not know what I would do if I were dying in prolonged and excruciating pain." -
The Met says it is committed to "colorblind casting" and that its production of Otello this fall will be the first without dark makeup since the opera was first seen at the company in 1891. -
A group that raises money for police officers subjected to investigation or lawsuits is using a simulator program to help outsiders understand the challenges of the job.
