About John @johnyangtv
John Yang is a correspondent for the PBS NewsHour. He covered the first year of the Trump administration and is currently reporting on major national issues from Washington, DC, and across the country.
Previously, Yang was a Chicago-based correspondent for NBC News, reporting for NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt, Today, and MSNBC. Yang was part of an NBC team that reported on “In Plain Sight: Poverty in America,” a 2013 George Foster Peabody Award recipient, and his reporting in April 2011 on tornado devastation in Alabama was included in an NBC Nightly News broadcast that received an Edward R. Murrow Award for Best Newscast.
Prior to joining NBC, Yang worked for ABC News, based in Washington, where he was weekend White House correspondent, and in Jerusalem, where he served as Middle East correspondent.
Yang has been part of teams that have been honored with an Emmy, two Peabody Awards and to Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia University Awards.
Yang’s career also includes time at The Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, TIME, and The Boston Globe. He is a cum laude graduate of Wesleyan University.
John’s Recent Stories
Making Sen$e Aug 02
How Trump’s tariffs changed the fates of these two factoriesHow are President Trump's tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum affecting manufacturers and workers? At two different Missouri factories, there are two very different stories. Mid Continent Steel and Wire, which makes nails, has already eliminated 100 jobs. But about…
Nation Jul 19
50 years after first games, Special Olympics aims for ‘inclusion revolution’Amid the tumult of the summer of 1968 came an event the likes of which the world had never seen: an Olympics for children with intellectual disabilities. At that first Special Olympics, founded by Eunice Kennedy Shriver, about 1,000 competitors…
Nation Jun 28
How these Alabama architecture students are improving lives with low-cost home designsFor decades, students and faculty from Auburn University's Rural Studio have been working, studying and living in Hale County, Alabama, and using architecture to serve the greater good. There, more than two dozen different homes that cost only $20,000 have…
Nation Jun 25
How families of gun owners with dementia grapple with safetyBy 2050 as many as 12 million people with dementia may live in homes with guns -- a fact that is prompting doctors, researchers and family members to ask how potential tragedies can be prevented. John Yang reports.
Education Jun 19
How do you make the benefits of pre-K education last?A study suggesting the benefits of pre-K may not be long-lasting has sparked debate in Tennessee, where proposals for state-funded, universal programs are an issue in this year's governor's race. What’s behind the finding, and what are the keys to…
Education Jun 05
How nontraditional pathways can lead workers to good jobsNot everyone takes a traditional route to a college degree that will prepare them for the workforce. John Yang talks with Nicole Smith of Georgetown University and Beth Cobert of the Markle Foundation about alternatives to help young adults and…
Nation May 30
Why defendants plead guilty to crimes they didn’t commitTwo brothers wrongly convicted of murder were granted a new trial, but then they faced an excruciating decision: plead guilty to a lesser crime and go home as convicted felons, or risk trial and the chance of going back to…
Nation May 30
Would you plead guilty? Share your story with the Trading Away Justice reporting projectYou've been arrested and you have a choice: Take your chances in court, or plead guilty and go home with time served and a criminal record? Which do you choose?…
Nation May 29
Self-awareness is key to self-sufficiency at this job training programFor workers trying to break the generational cycle of poverty, keeping a job can be as important as getting the job in the first place. As part of our series Chasing the Dream, John Yang reports on a program called…
Nation May 02
Missouri public defenders are overloaded with hundreds of cases while defendants wait in jailThe Sixth Amendment to the Constitution guarantees every American facing trial the right to a lawyer, even if they cannot afford one. But across the country, the public defender system is being stretched to the breaking point, and Missouri may…
