Ayesha Rascoe

Ayesha Rascoe is the host of NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday and the Saturday episodes of Up First. As host of the morning news magazine, she interviews news makers, entertainers, politicians and more about the stories that everyone is talking about or that everyone should be talking about.

Known for her southern roots and signature wit, Rascoe has been a mainstay on NPR’s programs since joining the outlet in 2018. Her new 2023 book is HBCU Made: A Celebration of the Black College Experience.

Prior to her role as host, Rascoe was a White House Correspondent. She covered three presidential administrations, gaining a reputation for her sharp questioning in the White House briefing room. Rascoe’s reporting included a number of high-profile foreign trips, including President Trump’s 2019 summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi, Vietnam, and President Obama’s final NATO summit in Warsaw, Poland in 2016. As a part of the White House team, she was also a regular on the NPR Politics Podcast.

Rascoe also guest hosted NPR’s It’s Been a Minute podcast and radio show and been a frequent guest on Pop Culture Happy Hour.

Before joining NPR, Rascoe spent the first decade of her career at Reuters, rising from a news assistant to an energy reporter to eventually covering the White House. While at Reuters, she covered some of the biggest energy and environmental stories of the past decade, including the 2010 BP oil spill and the U.S. response to the Fukushima nuclear crisis in 2011. She also spent a year covering energy legal issues and court cases.

Rascoe graduated from Howard University in 2007 with a B.A. in journalism.