Brakkton Booker
Brakkton Booker is a National Desk reporter based in Washington, DC.
He covers a wide range of topics including issues related to federal social safety net programs and news around the mid-Atlantic region of the United States.
His reporting takes him across the country covering natural disasters, like hurricanes and flooding, as well as tracking trends in regional politics and in state governments, particularly on issues of race.
Following the 2018 mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, Booker's reporting broadened to include a focus on young activists pushing for changes to federal and state gun laws, including the March For Our Lives rally and national school walkouts.
Prior to joining NPR's national desk, Booker spent five years as a producer/reporter for NPR's political unit. He spent most to the 2016 presidential campaign cycle covering the contest for the GOP nomination and was the lead producer from the Trump campaign headquarters on election night. Booker served in a similar capacity from the Louisville campaign headquarters of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in 2014. During the 2012 presidential campaign, he produced pieces and filed dispatches from the Republican and Democratic National conventions, as well as from President Obama's reelection site in Chicago.
In the summer of 2014, Booker took a break from politics to report on the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri.
Booker started his career as a show producer working on nearly all of NPR's magazine programs, including Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and former news and talk show Tell Me More, where he produced the program's signature Barbershop segment.
He earned a bachelor's degree from Howard University and was a 2015 Kiplinger Fellow. When he's not on the road, Booker enjoys discovering new brands of whiskey and working on his golf game.
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The new curfew for El Paso County, Texas went into effect just after midnight Wednesday and runs through Monday. The judge who issued the order said it was "not as rigid" as he wanted. -
Maradona rose from the slums of Buenos Aires to lead the Argentine national soccer team to World Cup glory, suffered from substance abuse and then had a second career as a coach. -
San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin called the charges "historic" and vowed to apply the law evenly "no matter what the color of your skin....or whether you wear a uniform to work." -
João Alberto Silveira Freitas died after an encounter with security guards outside a grocery store in southern Brazil. It was partially captured on cellphone video and later posted to social media. -
"The Morgue Attendant will be provided maximum PPE, will be tasked with physically moving bodies, and will require the ability to lift between 100-400 lbs. with assistance," the job listing states. -
Inmates must test negative for COVID-19 before their release. No one convicted of a sexual offense or crime of violence is eligible. The move is to protect both prisoners and prison employees. -
Atlas is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, a conservative-leaning think tank based at the university. He's currently on leave while he works as an adviser to President Trump. -
The NCAA said hosting a tournament across 13 U.S. cities "would be very difficult to execute." Talks are underway to try to hold all 67 games of the tournament in Indianapolis in March and April. -
After notching narrow victories in Michigan and Wisconsin on Wednesday, Joe Biden holds a lead in the march to 270. All eyes are on four key states: Georgia, Pennsylvania, Nevada and North Carolina.
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Wisconsin does not have automatic recounts, but a losing candidate can file a sworn petition requesting one if the margin of victory is less than 1%. Democrat Joe Biden leads by roughly 21,000 votes.
