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Lester Holt
| Lester Holt | |
 | |
| Basic facts | |
| Organization: | NBC News |
| Role: | Anchor and journalist |
| Location: | New York, N.Y. |
| Education: | California State University |
| Website: | Official website |
Lester Holt is an anchor and reporter for NBC News in New York City. He anchors the NBC Program Dateline.[1][2]
Background
Lester Holt was born in Marin County, California, in 1959. He attended California State University, dropping out in 1979 to work as a radio DJ.[6]
Work and activities
News anchor
In 1981, Holt began his TV news career with WCBS-TV in New York City. He transferred to KNXT-TV in Los Angeles as a reporter and weekend anchor in 1982.[7] In 1983, Holt returned to WCBS-TV as a reporter and weekend anchor.[7] From 1986 to 2000, Holt was a reporter and anchor with WBBM-TV in Chicago.[2][7] He was also a contributor to the CBS News program 48 Hours, winning the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for his reporting on "48 Hours: No Place Like Home" in 1990.[2]
In 2000, Holt joined NBC News and served as lead daytime anchor for MSNBC's coverage of the 2000 presidential election. From October 2002 to March 2003, he anchored a nightly news program on the Iraq conflict, Countdown: Iraq.[7] In 2003, he was named an anchor of NBC's TODAY weekend edition, also anchoring Lester Holt Live on MSNBC.[2] In 2007, he was named full-time anchor of Weekend Nightly News on NBC.[8] Holt was part of the TODAY show anchor team that won the daytime Emmy Award for outstanding morning program in 2010. He also served as anchor of NBC's investigative reporting show Dateline from 2011 to 2015.[7]
In February 2015, Holt was named interim anchor for NBC Nightly News in the wake of then-anchor Brian Williams' suspension. In June 2015, Holt was named the new anchor of NBC Nightly News, becoming the first African American to serve as a lead anchor of a broadcast network's weekday evening newscast.[2] He left in 2025, to work full time at Dateline.[9]
Presidential debates (2015-2016)
On December 16, 2015, NBC News announced that they—along with YouTube and the Congressional Black Caucus—would host the fourth Democratic presidential primary debate in Charleston, South Carolina. Holt moderated the debate, joined by "other NBC News political reporters and analysts."[3][4]
On September 2, 2016, the Commission on Presidential Debates announced the moderators for the 2016 general election debates between Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. The moderators were Lester Holt (September 26 debate) of NBC News, CNN's Anderson Cooper (October 9 debate), Martha Raddatz (October 9 debate) of ABC News, and Chris Wallace (October 19 debate) of Fox News Sunday. The vice presidential debate was moderated by Elaine Quijano (October 4) of CBS News.[5]
2020 Democratic primary debates
Holt moderated the ninth Democratic primary debate on February 19, 2020.[10]
2024 Republican primary debates
Holt, alongside Hugh Hewitt and Kristen Welker moderated the third Republican presidential primary debate on November 8, 2023.[11]
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Lester Holt. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- What is an influencer?
- Charleston, South Carolina NBC News/CBC Democratic debate (January 17, 2016)
- Presidential debate at Hofstra University (September 26, 2016)
- Commission on Presidential Debates
- Party Insiders grade Lester Holt’s debate moderating job
External links
- NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt website
- 9 things you didn't know about Lester Holt (video)
- Lester Holt on Facebook
- Lester Holt on Twitter
Footnotes
- ↑ NBC Newsm "Lester Holt," accessed August 5, 2025
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Biography, "Lester Holt," accessed January 11, 2016
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Politico, "NBC and YouTube to co-host Democratic debate on Jan. 17," December 16, 2015
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Deadline, "Lester Holt to moderate Democrats' first debate of 2016," December 16, 2015
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 CNN, "Presidential debate moderators announced," September 2, 2016
- ↑ Encyclopedia Britanica, "Lester Holt." accessed August 5, 2025
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 NBC Today, "Lester Holt, co-anchor of Today's weekend editions," June 4, 2013
- ↑ NBC News, "Lester Holt named anchor of NBC Nightly News," June 18, 2015
- ↑ USA Today, "Lester Holt bids farewell to 'Nightly News' after almost a decade: 'Been quite a ride'," May 30, 2025
- ↑ NBC News, "Full transcript: Ninth Democratic debate in Las Vegas," accessed August 6, 2025
- ↑ NBC News, "The war for second place got hot, but the third GOP debate didn't dent Trump," November 8, 2023
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