Michel Martin
Michel Martin is the weekend host of All Things Considered, where she draws 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.
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Technology has often been proposed as the solution to controversial policing practices. But reporter Matt Stroud says new innovations embraced by law enforcement can present their own problems. -
Last month, surgeons at Johns Hopkins Hospital made a medical breakthrough when they transplanted a kidney from Nina Martinez, who has HIV, to an HIV-positive person. -
Billy Porter of the TV series Pose wore a gender bending velvet tuxedo gown to the Oscars. "[Porter] just really wanted to wear something that made him feel really good," its designer Siriano said.
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NPR's Michel Martin talks with journalist Soledad O'Brien about her recent reporting on eating disorders among male athletes. O'Brien said social media played a big role in these eating disorders. -
Bennett College, a historically black women's college, could lose accreditation due to financial instability. President Phyllis Worthy Dawkins tells NPR's Michel Martin how the school raised millions. -
Shani Robinson was one of 11 Atlanta teachers convicted of altering standardized test results in 2015. In None of the Above, she pleads her innocence — and points a finger at systemic failure. -
Many wealthy families have chosen not to have their children play football, but for lower-income students, football is still seen as a ticket to a better education. -
Country star Kenny Chesney went into the studio as therapy after hurricanes tore through the U.S. Virgin Islands, the place he calls home. Those sessions became his latest album, Songs for the Saints. -
Award-winning Detroit native Morisseau authored a new musical that goes behind the scenes of the Motown quintet's signature smooth tunes, as told through the eyes of founding member, Otis Williams. -
The memoir of the Motown group's co-founder, Otis Williams, plays out in Ain't Too Proud. Although the successes of the fractious group came at a cost, Williams says the power of their music lives on.
