Josie Lenora
Politics/Government ReporterJosie Lenora is the Politics/Government Reporter for Little Rock Public Radio. She covers anything involving city government, the legislature, or the governor's office. Josie led up the 2024 "Arkansas Decides" election coverage, and is developing an anthology news podcast for the station. She is the occasional fill-in host for Morning Edition or All Things Considered.
Josie has ten first-place awards from the Arkansas Society of Professional Journalists. Her report on the Arkansas Department of Education's AP African American Studies ban won first place at the National Federation of Press Women Communications Contest for 2024.
She was the recipient of The National Press Foundations Elections Journalism Fellowship. She served on the board for the Arkansas Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists 2024-2025.
In 2025, she won an award from the Arkansas Press Women for her piece on a planned prison in Charleston, Arkansas. The same year, she won the UA Little Rock Ben Fry Award for Staff Achievement, and was the recipient of The Arkansas Press Women’s First Investigative Journalism Mini-Grant.
Her reporting has been featured on NPR's All Things Considered and Morning Edition. This includes the Lawsuit over "Critical Race Theory" in Schools, Arkansas drag bans and the State Monument to the Unborn. She freelanced audio for Gimlet's podcast "Crime Show," "Embedded: Taking Cover" from NPR and Dateline NBC's "Murder in Apartment 12."
Josie is an occasional guest on the Arkansas-PBS weekly news show "Arkansas Week," and moderated a televised congressional debate for the public TV station.
Josie has a B.A. in English/creative writing from Hendrix College in Conway.
Outside work, Josie is a crafting fanatic. Name a craft and she's probably tried it: renovating the insides of old dollhouses, making cards, polymer clay, needle felting, DIY home decorating and layered paper crafting.
Josie loves spin class, nonfiction audiobooks, caffeinated lattes, every shade of pink and her Maltese-Dachshund: Carter. She listens to as many podcasts as she can fit in a day.
Josie's excited to talk to you! Email: josie@littlerockpublicradio.org
-
The Eighth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals reinstated the ban on the curriculum Wednesday, though implementation may still be unclear. -
Over 400 people showed up to claim books for $1 each. -
Board members debated how to equitably divide the city into voting districts in a meeting Thursday. -
High-ranking Arkansas prison officials faced hours of tense questioning from lawmakers Thursday over the escape of a high-profile inmate. -
The response says harm is not sufficient for court intervention, since copies of the Ten Commandments have yet to be displayed in public buildings. -
The decades-long recurring contract seemed to be in temporary jeopardy at a meeting Monday. -
Protestors lined the Broadway Bridge over the Arkansas River as they cried out against President Donald Trump's policies. -
The law mandates a copy of the Ten Commandments be hung in all Arkansas public buildings, including school classrooms. -
The groups plan to sue the state while they work to pass an amendment rolling back restrictions to direct democracy. -
The suit alleges wrongful death and violations to the Fourth Amendment in the killing of former Little Rock Airport Director Bryan Malinowski.
