Don Lemon anchors CNN Newsroom during weekend prime-time and serves as a correspondent across CNN/U.S. programming. Based in the network’s New York bureau, Lemon joined CNN in September 2006.
A news veteran of Chicago, Lemon reported from Chicago in the days leading up to the 2008 presidential election, including an interview with then-Rep. Rahm Emanuel on the day he accepted the position of Chief of Staff for President-elect Barack Obama. He also interviewed Anne Cooper, the 106-year old voter President-elect Obama highlighted in his election night acceptance speech after he had seen Lemon’s interview with Cooper on CNN.
Lemon has reported and anchored on-the-scene for CNN from many breaking news stories, including the George Zimmerman trial (2013), the Boston marathon bombing (2013), the Philadelphia building collapse (2013), the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting (2012), the Colorado Theater Shooting (2012), the death of Whitney Houston, the Inaugural of the 44th President in Washington, D.C., the death of Michael Jackson (2009), Hurricane Gustav in Louisiana (2008) and the Minneapolis bridge collapse (2007).
Lemon has also anchored the network's breaking news coverage of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, the Arab Spring, the death of Osama Bin Laden and Joplin tornado. Lemon reported for CNN’s documentary Race and Rage: The Beating of Rodney King, which aired 20 years to the day of the beating. He is also known for holding politicians and public officials accountable in his "No Talking Points" segment.
Lemon joined CNN after serving as a co-anchor for the 5 p.m. newscast for NBC5 News in Chicago. He joined the station in August 2003 as an anchor and reporter after working in New York as a correspondent for NBC News, The Today Show and NBC Nightly News. In addition to his reporting in New York, Lemon worked as an anchor on Weekend Today and on MSNBC. While at NBC, Lemon covered the explosion of Space Shuttle Columbia, SARS in Canada and numerous other stories of national and global importance.
In addition to NBC5 and NBC News, Lemon has served as a weekend anchor and general assignment reporter for WCAU-TV, an NBC affiliate in Philadelphia, an anchor and investigative reporter for KTVI-TV in St. Louis and an anchor for WBRC-TV in Birmingham. He began his career at WNYW in New York City as a news assistant while still in college.
In 2009, Ebony named him as one of the Ebony Power 150: the most influential Blacks in America. He has won an Edward R. Murrow award for his coverage of the capture of the Washington, D.C. snipers. He won an Emmy for a special report on real estate in Chicagoland and various other awards for his reporting on the AIDS epidemic in Africa and Hurricane Katrina. In 2006, he won three more local Emmys for his reporting in Africa and a business feature about Craigslist, an online community.
Lemon serves as an adjunct professor at Brooklyn College, teaching and participating in curriculum designed around new media. He earned a degree in broadcast journalism from Brooklyn College and also attended Louisiana State University.
@DonLemonCNN
It’s hard to believe in 2014 we are still talking about the importance of diversity on television; more specifically the importance of African Americans on television.
Here’s why it’s even more surprising, Nielsen, the respected company in America that tracks television use and ratings show African-American consumers are 43 million strong and are more aggressive consumers of media and they shop more frequently.
Blacks watch more television (37%), make more shopping trips (eight), purchase more ethnic beauty and grooming products (nine times more), read more financial magazines (28%) and spend more than twice the time at personal hosted websites than any other group.
That’s why it comes as a shock to many people in America that a show as popular and revered as Saturday Night Live has not had a black, female cast member since 2007. Six years.
Many people on social media believe it’s not a big deal, writing, “Maybe because they didn’t find a funny one? Why is it quantity over quality?
Another person wrote, “Slow it down a bit. Maybe there aren’t enough black female comedians who meet SNL’s criteria. How come no Asians? Riddle me that.
As I said to a television writer last night on CNN, not having an Asian or another minority on the cast is not an excuse.
It only serves to magnify the problem.
Saturday Night Live hired six new cast members in 2013, five white men and one white woman. Not one black woman was in the group.
Every night in America you can walk into any comedy or improv club and see black women doing their thing and doing it well.
Don’t believe me? I challenge you to go to a comedy club this weekend.
Now, bowing to public pressure and criticism the show announced on Monday that it had hired New York comedian Sasheer Zamata just four years after she graduated from The University of Virginia.
She makes her premier on the show on January 18 when Drake is the musical guest.
Look for a Beyoncé spoof for sure, something Zamata says she’s good at.
And you’ll probably see a wicked Michelle Obama.
You can also look for a whole lot of scrutiny and criticism from some who are looking for an excuse to say she got her job to fill a quota, because she’s black.
That always happens from people who don’t understand the need for diversity and who don’t understand why it’s important to expand and enhance traditional recruiting methods to find diverse talent.
That said, it probably won’t be easy for Zamata who in the glaring spotlight that’s about to be trained on her is going to have to be a whole lot funnier than she is black.
