Ailsa Chang
Ailsa Chang is an award-winning journalist who hosts All Things Considered along with Ari Shapiro, Audie Cornish, and Mary Louise Kelly. She landed in public radio after practicing law for a few years.
Chang is a former Planet Money correspondent, where she got to geek out on the law while covering , , , and the .
Previously, she was a congressional correspondent with NPR's Washington Desk. She covered battles over healthcare, immigration, gun control, executive branch appointments, and the federal budget.
Chang started out as a radio reporter in 2009, and has since earned a string of national awards for her work. In 2012, she was honored with the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Silver Baton for her . The series also earned honors from Investigative Reporters and Editors and the Society of Professional Journalists.
She was also the recipient of the Daniel Schorr Journalism Award, a National Headliner Award, and an honor from Investigative Reporters and Editors for her investigation on how Detroit's broken public defender system leaves lawyers with insufficient resources to effectively represent their clients.
In 2011, the New York State Associated Press Broadcasters Association named Chang as the winner of the Art Athens Award for General Excellence in Individual Reporting for radio. In 2015, she won a National Journalism Award from the Asian American Journalists Association for her coverage of Capitol Hill.
Prior to coming to NPR, Chang was an investigative reporter at NPR Member station WNYC from 2009 to 2012 in New York City, focusing on criminal justice and legal affairs. She was a Kroc fellow at NPR from 2008 to 2009, as well as a reporter and producer for NPR Member station KQED in San Francisco.
The former lawyer served as a law clerk to Judge John T. Noonan Jr. on the United States Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco.
Chang graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University where she received her bachelor's degree.
She earned her law degree with distinction from Stanford Law School, where she won the Irving Hellman Jr. Special Award for the best piece written by a student in the Stanford Law Review in 2001.
Chang was also a Fulbright Scholar at Oxford University, where she received a master's degree in media law. She also has a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University.
She grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she never got to have a dog. But now she's the proud mama of Mickey Chang, a shih tzu who enjoys slapping high-fives and mingling with senators.
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The Senate has blocked a bill introduced by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, which had proposed revisions to military procedures for punishing and preventing sexual assault.
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The law, passed in 2012, was meant to shift the financial risk of insuring flood-zone properties to homeowners. But some residents' premiums have skyrocketed. -
The Democrat has won some conservatives in the state with her strong defense of the oil industry. But her support for Obamacare may sink her. -
Eager to follow their House colleagues out of Washington for a break, senators Wednesday cleared a raise to the debt ceiling for the president to sign into law. It will take the issue of limiting U.S. debt off the table until March 2015.
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The Senate is still struggling to find a way to pay for an extension of unemployment benefits for those out of work for 26 weeks or more. Majority leader Harry Reid agreed to bring up five Democratic and five Republican amendments in hopes to winning enough Republicans over to get to the 60 votes needed for passage.
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Momentum to pass tighter gun laws surged after the shootings in Newtown, Conn., a year ago. But a provision to expand background checks failed in the Senate. In that loss, gun control activists say they learned some important lessons from those who lobbied against them. -
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a popular Democrat, former governor and strong proponent of the Affordable Care Act, is taking some heat back home for the problems with HealthCare.gov. She faces re-election next year, but a formidable Republican opponent has yet to emerge. -
Twenty-nine lawmakers are supposed to come up with a long-term budget deal by mid-December. They meet again Wednesday around a conference table, facing huge hurdles and led by two people who couldn't be more different: Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington state and Republican Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. -
Lobbyists are known for their influence, but perhaps less obvious is that lobbyists often write legislation 鈥� sometimes word for word. In a recent example, media reports showed how bank lobbyists had a hand in drafting a House bill aimed at rolling back financial regulations. -
As Republicans slam the messy rollout of HealthCare.gov, Democrats in conservative states could score political points by supporting an extension of the open enrollment period.