Ayesha Rascoe, a White House correspondent for NPR, will be the new host of “Weekend Edition Sunday.”
“This job will allow me to show fully all sides of myself,” Rascoe said. “I am someone who loves to ask tough questions and dig into policy and look at politics and world issues – all of that I’ve been able to do covering the White House. But I also like the arts and books and horror movies and thrillers and shows. And so I like being able to do that mix.”
After initially joining NPR in 2018 and nearly a decade being a reporter at Reuters, Ms. Rascoe will take on her new role on March 27, which will also entail hosting weekend installments of NPR’s news podcast, “Up First,” along with “Weekend Edition Saturday” host, Scott Simon. Also, after graduating from Howard University, in Washington, D.C., Rascoe rose from being a news assistant to covering the Obama and Trump administrations for the global news service.
Rascoe fills a role left by Lulu Garcia-Navarro, who hosted the program for five years until October when she joined The New York Times’s Opinion audio team. In an interview, Rascoe said increasing diversity is a challenge NPR must address – as must the network’s peers throughout the country. Rascoe says she has been embraced by hosts who have left the network and those who remain and has felt support from the network and its listeners.
