The PBS NewsHour of Today – Reaching Larger Audiences in More Places than Ever Before

Distributed at PBS NewsHour’s virtual July 2022 TCA panel on Thursday, July 28, 2022

ARLINGTON, VA (Thursday, July 28) — Given strategic investments in recent years and under the leadership of PBS NewsHour senior executive producer Sara Just, the NewsHour of today is reaching more and new audiences with timely news and information than ever before. Anchored by Judy Woodruff, PBS’s marquee nightly newscast has vastly expanded its reach and capacity with the April 2022 debut of PBS News Weekend, the 2021 launch of its Communities Initiative and newly established Digital Anchor desk, and the 2019 opening of PBS News Western Bureau in Phoenix, among other efforts. As the primary daily news producer for PBS, the NewsHour of today is better poised to report on breaking news for broadcast and online audiences from more places and with greater access to all corners of the country.

In addition to its Monday – Sunday night broadcasts, NewsHour is also PBS’s primary producer for breaking and special news events. In prime time and daytime, NewsHour has recently produced special broadcasts for the January 6^th congressional hearings, the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe vs. Wade, and the Senate confirmation hearings for Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. Forthcoming special coverage includes Midterm Election Night returns on November 8 and the October 5 premiere of “Ricochet: An American Trauma,” the forthcoming NewsHour documentary exploring the trauma of gun violence in America.

PBS News Weekend, which relaunched in April 2022, is anchored by Geoff Bennett who also serves as the weekday broadcast’s Chief Washington Correspondent. PBS NewsHour, a wholly owned subsidiary of WETA, took over production of the Saturday and Sunday news broadcast in April 2022, thus consolidating production of PBS’s nightly news programming under one roof. The team is led by executive producer Rachel Wellford, airs for 30 minutes each night on PBS stations and online, and features in studio interviews and reports from the field.

PBS NewsHour’s Communities Initiative launched in August 2021 with the mission to further the depth and insight of NewsHour’s journalism and news team. It expands NewsHour’s reporting bench to include journalists in cities often given little attention in national news coverage, which are often Black, Indigenous and communities of color, to better capture the human experiences of a broad range of the communities that make up the country. To date, there are five Communities Initiative reporters located in the Dearborn/Detroit region, Fresno, New Orleans, Oklahoma City, and St. Louis. The project is co-managed by senior digital editors Aaron Foley and Josh Barajas.

Also in 2021, PBS NewsHour named Nicole Ellis its first Digital Anchor and correspondent, where she anchors pre- and post-shows for PBS NewsHour special and breaking news broadcasts, as well as hosts original digital video. The introduction of this role is pivotal to NewsHour’s commitment to expand its digital capabilities and program more regularly online after seeing record growth across platforms. Also new in the social space this year, NewsHour launched its TikTok account to bring the same high-quality journalism it’s known for to the platform and its burgeoning audience.

PBS NewsHour West, which launched at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication in 2019, allows for NewsHour’s nightly broadcast to better serve audiences in the west and online. In addition to covering the region for all platforms, the PBS NewsHour West team, including West anchor and NewsHour correspondent Stephanie Sy and senior producer Phil Maravilla, update PBS NewsHour’s 6:00 p.m. Eastern time zone broadcast for audiences in the Pacific time zone, also carried as late broadcasts on radio, television and streaming platforms.

For the first half of 2022, PBS NewsHour’s audience averaged nearly 2 million nightly viewers while PBS News Weekend averaged more than 750,000 nightly viewers. NewsHour’s average monthly digital audience surpassed 27 million with nearly 48 million average monthly video views.

Anchor and managing editor Judy Woodruff in May 2022 announced her intent to step aside from the PBS NewsHour anchor desk by the end of 2022. She will remain with the NewsHour, WETA and PBS doing a variety of reporting projects. Related details including as they pertain to the anchor desk, will be announced in the fall of 2022.

About PBS NewsHour
PBS NewsHour is a production of NewsHour Productions LLC, a wholly-owned non-profit subsidiary of WETA Washington, DC. Major corporate funding is provided by BNSF, Consumer Cellular, Fidelity, Johnson & Johnson, and Raymond James, with additional support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Ford Foundation, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, The Kendeda Fund, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Science Foundation, The Pew Charitable Trusts, the Skoll Foundation, the Walton Family Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Friends of the NewsHour and others. More information on PBS NewsHour is available at www.pbs.org/newshour. You can watch and find NewsHour on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. NewsHour Productions also produces PBS News Weekend and Washington Week.

Press Contact: Ella Richardson, Publicist, erichardson (at) newshour (dot) org