Nina Totenberg
Nina Totenberg is NPR's award-winning legal affairs correspondent. Her reports air regularly on NPR's critically acclaimed newsmagazines All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and Weekend Edition.
Totenberg's coverage of the Supreme Court and legal affairs has won her widespread recognition. She is often featured in documentaries — most recently RBG — that deal with issues before the court. As Newsweek put it, "The mainstays [of NPR] are Morning Edition and All Things Considered. But the creme de la creme is Nina Totenberg."
In 1991, her ground-breaking report about University of Oklahoma Law Professor Anita Hill's allegations of sexual harassment by Judge Clarence Thomas led the Senate Judiciary Committee to re-open Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation hearings to consider Hill's charges. NPR received the prestigious George Foster Peabody Award for its gavel-to-gavel coverage — anchored by Totenberg — of both the original hearings and the inquiry into Anita Hill's allegations, and for Totenberg's reports and exclusive interview with Hill.
That same coverage earned Totenberg additional awards, including the Long Island University George Polk Award for excellence in journalism; the Sigma Delta Chi Award from the Society of Professional Journalists for investigative reporting; the Carr Van Anda Award from the Scripps School of Journalism; and the prestigious Joan S. Barone Award for excellence in Washington-based national affairs/public policy reporting, which also acknowledged her coverage of Justice Thurgood Marshall's retirement.
Totenberg was named Broadcaster of the Year and honored with the 1998 Sol Taishoff Award for Excellence in Broadcasting from the National Press Foundation. She is the first radio journalist to receive the award. She is also the recipient of the American Judicature Society's first-ever award honoring a career body of work in the field of journalism and the law. In 1988, Totenberg won the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton for her coverage of Supreme Court nominations. The jurors of the award stated, "Ms. Totenberg broke the story of Judge (Douglas) Ginsburg's use of marijuana, raising issues of changing social values and credibility with careful perspective under deadline pressure."
Totenberg has been honored seven times by the American Bar Association for continued excellence in legal reporting and has received more than two dozen honorary degrees. On a lighter note, Esquire magazine twice named her one of the "Women We Love."
A frequent contributor on TV shows, she has also written for major newspapers and periodicals — among them, The New York Times Magazine, The Harvard Law Review, The Christian Science Monitor, and New York Magazine, and others.
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Kate Ranta is one of those who filed a brief at the Supreme Court in support of gun restrictions in a case that will be heard next week. She was almost killed by her husband several years ago.
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At the Supreme Court Wednesday, a case asks whether a California lawyer can own a federal trademark covering the phrase "Trump Too Small."
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The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in a pair of important cases that test the ability of public officials to block critics from their personal social media pages.
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The cases — from Michigan and California — echo issues raised in a now-defunct suit against then-President Donald Trump for blocking his critics on Twitter. -
The six conservative members of the Supreme Court seemed likely to dash Democratic hopes for a chance to win a second congressional seat in South Carolina. -
At issue is the way the Republican-dominated state legislature equalized the population of its congressional districts. -
The Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday in a case that targets the validity of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
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Payday lenders argue that the CFPB's funding structure is unconstitutional because it's not funded by money appropriated by Congress. The argument threatens the existence of other agencies, too. -
The Supreme Court is back on the bench for a new term full of cases involving controversial issues — like guns, abortion, social media and more.
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In one form or another, all those questions are back on the table this term — mainly to take a second look at appeals from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Texas and parts the South.
