*Yamiche Alcindor, White House correspondent for PBS NewsHour, has been tapped to takeover as the new moderator of “Washington Week,” the PBS public affairs show.
Alcindor will succeed Robert Costa at a program that is best known as the longtime home of the anchor Gwen Ifill. Costa departed the show in January after moderating since 2017. Alcindor has served as guest moderator since then, per Deadline.
“This show has an amazing legacy, and I am thrilled to step into it. I hope to build on it, to expand it and to bring this show forward distinctively into these times of challenge and controversy,” she said in a statement. “In doing so, my guiding light will be serving our audiences and not shying away from the hard conversations about power and politics.”
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I’m honored to become the next moderator of @washingtonweek, a show that meant so much to Gwen Ifill when she helmed this chair. My guiding light will be focusing on the impact of politics on everyday people and vulnerable populations. Join me this Friday. https://t.co/6WqpjcIL6k
— Yamiche Alcindor (@Yamiche) May 4, 2021
When Alcindor learned last month that she would become the next moderator of “Washington Week,” she “instantly cried,” Alcindor recalled, “thinking about Gwen.”
“I know how much ‘Washington Week’ meant to Gwen, and how much she put her stamp on the legacy of the show,” Alcindor, who is Haitian-American, said in an interview. “I also feel this incredible responsibility to think deeply about taking this on and making it a show that people want to watch, that people will feel is living up to its great legacy.”
Alcindor will continue her role on PBS NewsHour, as well as a contributor for NBC News and MSNBC. As the new moderator of “Washington Week,” she plans to maintain the show’s signature style of “respect and respectability.”
“There can be this sense, when you are working and living in Washington, that everything is about what’s going on in D.C.,” Alcindor said. “So much of what has guided my journalism is, how are vulnerable populations being impacted by these policies? That will be my guiding light.”
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