InFrame

Out on Air: LGBTQ+ TV Journalists Changing the News

Photo Credit: Tre’vell Anderson  / Instagram

by Timothy Rawles  Mar 16

Sometimes LGBTQ+ news in not about the people making it but the people reporting it. It’s still representation but from the backend. That matters because the faces we see on screen. Or read in print, are the ones who inspire us, make us feel we have someone on our side. Of course, media today is as polarizing as two magnets. One is conservative, the other is more liberal, and both have their opinions. We seem to have passed the age of objectivity in journalism. That’s why it’s more important now more than ever to have queer voices not only making news but delivering it. 

The LGBTQ+ journalists and editors below are influencing the tone and direction of modern reporting. Let’s explore several of these men and women and their impact on network television and social media platforms. 

Anderson Cooper 

Talk about influential gay people in the media. Anderson Cooper might be the most recognized. His ability to deliver hard hitting news about current events then loosen up and show us his other side away from the anchor desk is masterclass. Who can forget his deadpan drunken antics with Andy Cohen every New Year’s Eve or his hilarious cameos on Saturday Night Live? Cooper can deliver the worst stories about the world one day but makes us feel a little better with some humor the next. 



Rachel Maddow 

Don’t mess with Rachel Maddow, she’s not one to back down. Her political commentary on both Trump administrations cut through all the hyperbole to focus on what’s really going on. Although her opinions are divisive, a political analyst must weigh both sides, calling out the system’s inequities, and her commentary reshaped cable news discourse.

In her personal life, she’s in a relationship with photographer Susan Mikula. Maddow was outed by her school newspaper when she was a freshman edited she had a chance to tell her parents. “They would have had a hard time with me coming out anyway, but this was a particularly nasty way for them to find out,” she told Time



Jonathan Capehart  

Popular MSNBC host Jonathan Capehart actually got his start in print journalism at New York Daily in 1993. He might be best known for his work at The Washington Post. He also won a Pulitzer Prize for an article he contributed to in New York Daily News. 

He married Nick Schmit in 2017; former U.S. attorney general Eric Holder officiated their wedding ceremony.

Schmit often discusses inequalities prevalent in society when it comes to race and sexuality. In The Advocate , he said just before starting his stint on his Sunday morning political talk show,  “I'm an African-American, openly gay married man, and those qualities alone bring a different perspective than the other folks who are sitting in those Sunday morning show chairs."



Nico Lang 

Nico Lang has been reporting on LGBTQ issues, especially trans rights and their societal inequalities, for over a decade. At that time, trans men and women were gaining recognition on a world scale. Lang was at the forefront of that movement 

“I've been working with families of trans youth since about 2016. When I saw the rising anti-trans hatred at a legislative level circa 2020-2021, I recognized that a deeper kind of storytelling was needed,” they told The Tucson Sentinel when they asked them about their book “American Teenager: How Trans Kids Are Surviving Hate and Finding Joy in a Turbulent Era.” 



Tre’vell Anderson  

Tre’vell Anderson is a culture writer who has won awards for their coverage which has been extensive. They wrote for Out Magazine then went on to became editor-at-large for Xtra Magazine. With their many studies and observations of society as it pertains to trans folks, they wrote the book, “We See Each Other: A Black, Trans Journey Through TV and Film” “‘We See Each Other’ is an effort to share the story of how I came to be who I am in part through the images that I saw on screen,” Anderson told Publishers Weekly .


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