Vanessa Romo
Vanessa Romo is a reporter for NPR's News Desk. She covers breaking news on a wide range of topics, weighing in daily on everything from immigration and the treatment of migrant children, to a war-crimes trial where a witness claimed he was the actual killer, to an alleged sex cult. She has also covered the occasional cat-clinging-to-the-hood-of-a-car story.
Before her stint on the News Desk, Romo spent the early months of the Trump Administration on the Washington Desk covering stories about culture and politics – the voting habits of the post-millennial generation, the rise of Maxine Waters as a septuagenarian pop culture icon and DACA quinceañeras as Trump protests.
In 2016, she was at the core of the team that launched and produced The New York Times' first political podcast, The Run-Up with Michael Barbaro. Prior to that, Romo was a Spencer Education Fellow at Columbia University's School of Journalism where she began working on a radio documentary about a pilot program in Los Angeles teaching black and Latino students to code switch.
Romo has also traveled extensively through the Member station world in California and Washington. As the education reporter at Southern California Public Radio, she covered the region's K-12 school districts and higher education institutions and won the Education Writers Association first place award as well as a Regional Edward R. Murrow for Hard News Reporting.
Before that, she covered business and labor for Member station KNKX, keeping an eye on global companies including Amazon, Boeing, Starbucks and Microsoft.
A Los Angeles native, she is a graduate of Loyola Marymount University, where she received a degree in history. She also earned a master's degree in Journalism from NYU. She loves all things camaron-based.
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Debate is hot about the impact of a higher minimum wage. Half a million Californians work in fast-food, where wages had stagnated for decades. Restaurant owners warn of higher prices and fewer hours. -
They're among three lawmakers who were recorded talking in racist terms. And though they've been stripped of assignments and haven't been attending meetings, they're still collecting hefty paychecks.
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Nine-year-old Aubriella Melchor said she narrowly escaped the slaughter because she'd been in the bathroom. At a gas station, Christian bikers joined the girl and her mother to pray. -
Officials have linked a set of keys to an abandoned U-Haul van found blocks from the Brooklyn shooting. Investigators say the van was rented by Frank R. James in Philadelphia. -
The plaintiffs alleged that the organizers and participants of the 2017 Unite the Right rally conspired to commit violence and interfered with their right to be free from racially motivated violence. -
After a little more than five hours debating the charges, the jury went home for the night without reaching a verdict. -
The Waukesha police chief identified Darrell E. Brooks as the only suspect in the tragic vehicular attack that killed at least five people and injured 48 others on Sunday. -
Travis McMichael, his father, Greg, and William 'Roddie' Bryan have all been charged with Arbery's murder. The high-profile shooting helped spark protests for racial justice in the summer of 2020. -
The 7-month-old spotted beauty was rescued from wildlife trafficking and will be living alongside a 6-year-old male named Valerio. There are only 15,000 believed to be living in the wild. -
The nearly all-white jury has been sent home until Monday, when they're expected to hear closing arguments. Earlier in the day, Travis McMichael, who killed Arbery, underwent cross-examination.
