Ashley Westerman
Ashley Westerman is a producer who occasionally directs the show. Since joining the staff in June 2015, she has produced a variety of stories including a coal mine closing near her hometown, the 2016 Republican National Convention, and the Rohingya refugee crisis in southern Bangladesh. She is also an occasional reporter for Morning Edition, and NPR.org, where she has contributed reports on both domestic and international news.
Ashley was a summer intern in 2011 with Morning Edition and pitched a story on her very first day. She went on to work as a reporter and host for member station 89.3 WRKF in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where she earned awards covering everything from healthcare to jambalaya.
Ashley is an East-West Center 2018 Jefferson Fellow and a two-time reporting fellow with the International Center for Journalists. Through ICFJ, she has covered labor issues in her home country of the Philippines for NPR and health care in Appalachia for Voice of America.
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The president visited the city of Live Oak in northern Florida, about an hour northeast of where Hurricane Idalia made landfall earlier this week. -
Police are still working to identify the vehicle and driver in the Sunday afternoon incident. -
Singaporean national Saridewi Djamani, 45, was convicted in 2018 of trafficking over 30 grams of heroin. She is first woman to be hanged since 2004. -
Shinjiro Atae shared the personal revelation on Wednesday evening with an auditorium filled with thousands in Tokyo. -
After a pod of nearly 100 pilot whales beached themselves on Tuesday, more than 50 of them died overnight. Now officials say the remaining 47 will be euthanized. -
Tonga is just one stop on a tour of the Pacific by Secretary of State Antony Blinken this week. He is the latest in a parade of US diplomats to visit Oceania in the last year. -
Taylor Sheesh, the Philippines' top Taylor Swift impersonator, has set out on her own tour across the country in a bid to get the global superstar's attention. -
Host team New Zealand defeated Norway 1-0 in the opening game of the tournament, following a brief pause to remember those killed and injured in a shooting in Auckland just hours before. -
King, 23, was stationed in South Korea, but was scheduled to fly back to the U.S. to face disciplinary action when he escaped an airport outside of Seoul and managed to flee into North Korea. -
While Russia and Belarus will not receive formal invitations, the International Olympic Committee says it will not stop athletes from the two countries from participating as neutral contestants.
