Jonathan Franklin is a Washington, D.C.-based journalist specializing in digital and broadcast news.

Hey there! 👋🏾 I’m Jonathan. I’m an award-winning reporter for National Public Radio (NPR), where I cover race and its intersection with culture, identity, and justice.

For the last several years, I’ve been reporting and covering a broad spectrum of local and national news across the nation's capital and the United States.

I’ve been at the forefront of reporting on some of the most significant national stories to break during my time at NPR, including the death of Tyre Nichols by Memphis, Tenn. police, the Tops Supermarket mass shooting in Buffalo, N.Y., the Waukesha, Wis., Christmas parade attack, the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

My reporting can be seen and heard on NPR’s digital, social, and audio platforms, including All Things Considered, Morning Edition, Up First, Consider This, and NPR News Now.

I also frequently contribute to WSE’s The Right Time with Bomani Jones podcast.

Before NPR, I spent two years as a digital multimedia journalist for WUSA9, the CBS affiliate in Washington, D.C., where I covered the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the Black community, D.C.’s racial protests and demonstrations following the murder of George Floyd, the 2020 presidential election and the January 6 insurrection on the U.S. Capitol. (Yes, I know – it was a lot.)

My journalism career began as a news fellow at WDCW in Washington, D.C., which gave me the chance to freelance for them once my fellowship ended.

If you’ve seen, read, or heard my work, it is filled with engaging ledes, videos, live reports, and insightful anecdotes that put the focus on the people and communities at the heart of the stories I tell. Outside the newsroom, I am an adjunct professor and capstone advisor for Georgetown University's journalism master's program.

Originally from Columbia, South Carolina, I hold a master's degree in journalism from Georgetown University, with a focus on broadcast and digital media. I also have undergraduate degrees in English and African American Studies from Wofford College.

I’m a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc., both the National and Washington Associations of Black Journalists, the Online News Association, The National Press Club, and the Society of Professional Journalists.

Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and X (formerly known as Twitter) for all things news and life!