LGBTQ Critics Group GALECA Names America’s 10 Best TV News Journalists

The  500+ professional critics and entertainment journalists of GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics has unveiled its picks for the 10 best on-air television news journalists working today. Full disclosure – I’ve been a proud member of GALECA for years.

Thank you, Mark Mwachiro & @Adweek, for noting GALECA’s 10 Best On-Air TV News Journalists membership poll . . . pic.twitter.com/iTMYs7DLKG

— GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (@DorianAwards) October 26, 2024

In alphabetical order, GALECA’s 10 Best TV News Journalists are: Christiane Amanpour, Jonathan Capehart, Kaitlan Collins, Anderson Cooper, Mehdi Hasan, Lester Holt, Rachel Maddow, David Muir, Robin Roberts and Jacob Soboroff. Via press release from GALECA Executive Director John Griffith: Asked recently to name the one TV news anchor or on-air reporter whose journalistic expertise most impresses them, GALECA members nominated an inspiringly varied group of news gatherers, from investigative icon Christiane Amanpour to media disruptor Mehdi Hasan. “It’s great to see GALECA’s members recognize these stellar journalists in what obviously remains a very powerful medium,” said group president Walt Hickey. “With the world facing so much today, it feels really important to champion the pros who, with their teams, investigate and report on the stories that impact us with clarity and perspective.” Christiane Amanpour One of the most honored, fearless—and peripatetic—TV journalists of our time, Amanpour currently serves as CNN’s Chief International Anchor. When she isn’t reporting from the field on global developments, she challenges world leaders with tough questions on her three current affairs shows. Her weeknight PBS version, Amanpour & Company, offers the most wide-ranging coverage. Jonathan Capehart Capehart juggles hosting his own weekend political show on MSNBC with associate editor duties at The Washington Post. In his podcast for the latter, he delves into topics like the latest in climate change, the humanitarian crisis in war-torn Sudan, and the science of aging. He also shares takes on the headlines alongside moderate conservative David Brooks in Brooks & Capehart, a weekly segment on PBS NewsHour. Kaitlan Collins GALECA members obviously appreciate a redemption story. During college, Collins used some homophobic pejoratives bantering with friends on Twitter. Her first job out of college: Entertainment reporter for a dodgy website run by Tucker Carlson. Within a few years, though, she pivoted—hard—to politics and CNN, where she quickly gained a reputation for fact-checking leaders when they spewed misinformation. In 2018, an irritated Trump administration barred her from attending White House press conferences. Collins now calmly holds the powerful accountable and lands scoops as host of CNN’s The Source. Anderson Cooper The venerable CNN anchor still finds time to report from Ukraine to Israel to seemingly every natural disaster zone. He’s also an occasional correspondent for CBS’ 60 Minutes, where in an April segment he got comic Kevin Hart to apologize for his past homophobic tirades. Last year, Cooper began hosting CNN’s The Whole Story, an impressively in-depth news investigation series he created and executive produces. Mehdi Hasan Hasan first gained major attention hosting a hard-hitting news show on MSNBC (he developed his take-no-prisoners approach as a news editor for the U.K.’s Channel 4 network). Today, he interviews global figures like Israeli historian Benny Morris as host of Al Jazeera’s Head to Head and writes a column for The Guardian US—all while running his fledgling “adversarial journalism” venture, Zateo (an ancient Greek word meaning “seeking out”). Lester Holt NBC’s steady Nightly News anchor showed his mettle as fact-checker-in-chief during the 2016 Hillary Clinton-Donald Trump presidential debate. He has also delivered incisive reports on the COVID-19 pandemic, political disinformation, and the Israel-Hamas War. How Holt finds time to main-anchor the murder-investigation series Dateline is its own mystery. Rachel Maddow Maddow has long been one of GALECA’s favorite TV journalists. Diving deep into history to shed light on current global dilemmas, the MSNBC anchor—also an author and podcaster—sometimes pokes fun at her own wonkiness. But members clearly appreciate how Maddow lays out information and exposes disinformation in her fights against kleptocracy and fascism. Over the years, she and her show have won three of the group’s Dorian Awards and received 11 nominations. David Muir The ABC World News Tonight anchor impressed many viewers when he firmly fact-checked some of Donald Trump’s most outlandish fabrications during Trump’s presidential debate with Vice President Kamala Harris. A former international news reporter for ABC, Muir has trekked the globe to investigate famine in Madagascar, the Israel-Hamas war, and more. He also manages to cohost his network’s newsmagazine show, 20/20. Robin Roberts As cohost of ABC’s Good Morning America and special reporter for the network’s World News Tonight, Roberts has touched hearts with her accounts of facing cancer, a rare blood disorder, and witnessing her Mississippi hometown’s devastation by Hurricane Katrina. Her recent interviews with newsmakers like Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and WNBA star Caitlin Clark have only boosted her reputation as one of America’s most thoughtful on-air journalists. Earlier this year, she received the Poynter Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Journalism. Jacob Soboroff Soboroff, a political and national correspondent for NBC News and MSNBC, stands out for his determined exposés on the U.S.-Mexico border crisis and the ongoing plight of immigrants. Separated: Inside an American Tragedy, his 2021 investigative book on the Trump administration’s policy of separating migrant families, provided the basis for a new documentary directed by Oscar winner Errol Morris (The Fog of War). Soboroff has also reported from hotspots like Haiti and this year’s Republican National Convention.