Based in Los Angeles, Mosley was a former correspondent and host. here and now, was the organizer and Silicon Valley bureau chief of KQED in San Francisco.she hosts a podcast Tell the truth.
Terry Gross, host:
This is fresh air. I’m Terry Gross. If you’re a regular FRESH AIR listener, you’ve probably heard me feature an interview with guest interviewer girlfriend Tonya Mosley. Well, Tonya has an interview today, but she’s no longer a guest interviewer. She is delighted that she is now a co-host of FRESH AIR. You can listen to more of her interviews on our show. You might be wondering what that means for Dave Davies, who has been interviewing on our show for nearly 20 years and has a huge following. Well, here’s the story.
For a long time he wanted to do less interviews and have more time to do other things in his life, but we just kept him tied up again. Over the past year, he’s been generous enough to take on more work than I expected in exchange for an actual interview. the following. Fortunately for us and for you, we are not allowing him to leave completely. He will remain part of the FRESH AIR family and will continue to do his interviews, but in fewer numbers. In case you’re wondering what this means to me, I’m still the moderator and will be doing about the same number of interviews.
We are delighted to have Tonya officially join the FRESH AIR family. Let her tell you a little bit about her. Let her start with her resume. As you may already know, Tonya was the correspondent and host of the daytime radio show Here & Now in Boston, co-produced by She’s NPR and She’s WBUR. She was the host and Silicon Valley bureau chief at her KQED in San Francisco. Prior to that, she was an American television correspondent for Al Jazeera and a television reporter in several cities. She received a John S. Knight Journalism Fellowship at Stanford University, where she co-founded a workshop for journalists on the impact of implicit bias on reporting. She won a Marlow Award from the Radio, Television and Digital News Association for her public radio series “Black In Seattle” and an Emmy Award in 2016 for her work “Beyond Ferguson”.
I highly recommend this season of her podcast Truth Be Told. It’s about using psychedelics to deal with trauma, especially racial trauma. She interweaves her own experiences in the report, including race-related trauma and a retreat she went to for mushrooms for therapeutic purposes. Episode 4 was just posted. I’ve heard of the first three of hers and they were so engaging and enlightening.
Tonya, I’m so happy to have you as co-host. You are in LA and live with your family. I ended up working at NPR West, NPR’s studio in LA. As usual, I’m in Philadelphia. Working on two different coasts is something new that both the producers and I have to get used to, but you’ve done it before with Here & Now, which is being produced in Boston. What was it like working with people from another coast?
Tonya Mosley, Host:
Well, first let me say that this is a real pleasure. And I was very surprised to hear that you read my bio. But you know, when I started Here & Now three and a half years before him, it was only a few months before the pandemic. And we were in the same position. We worked together trying to find a way to host on separate shores. And I was compelled to do it given all the considerations that one has to think about when it comes to doing a show in a closet and hosting a show in a closet. And we were able to do it and get the job done. And now I feel like I’m obsolete for doing it. I’m sure you’ll be fine. And it’s great that technology has caught up with our needs.
Gross: How different is FRESH AIR from your previous work?
Moseley: Like you, I have interviewed thousands of people throughout my career. But the difference between my work and that of FRESH AIR is that the experience with people was very short (5 or 10 minutes). I would appreciate it if you could sit with people for half an hour. And this piece can get deep and narrow to me in ways I’ve always dreamed of, and in ways listeners have come to expect from shows like FRESH AIR and NPR more generally. So when I say this is a dream come true, it’s really true. You can finally dig in.
Gross: Oh, good. That’s very nice. What kind of interviews are you most looking forward to doing or what topics would you most like to cover?
Moseley: Well, that’s a tough question for someone like me. Because I shy away from the word generalist. Because it sounds directionless to me. But really, I love different topics, so I’m a generalist. And I love talking to so many different types of people and learning about new experiences. But more concretely, I think what FRESH AIR has provided listeners is an opportunity to understand the moment we are in, to understand ourselves and each other. And when I listen to your old shows, I find that those moments when you were interviewing those people give us a sense of where we’ve been and where we’re going.
For example, a long time ago, I heard an old show you were doing in 1981, and it was about gender reassignment surgery. And today we regularly talk about this. And it was interesting to hear, because we know where that seed started and where it is today. So I look forward to being that kind of presence for our listeners in this moment, and looking forward to perhaps providing a roadmap for those looking back at this period in history in the future.
Gross: Well, Tonya, I’m so happy to have you on the show. And I look forward to interviewing you in person in the near future to get to know you better. In the meantime, I would like to say welcome. It is an honor to have you as a co-organizer. I have an interview for today. So please tell me what it’s about.
Mosley: Well, we’ve been looking at a series of investigative reports over the past few months that show that children of immigrants, mostly from Central America, are among the most at risk in our country. It became clear that he had several jobs. And, according to The New York Times, this shadow workforce is pervasive across industries, from construction sites to slaughterhouses to factories filled with immigrant children who make products for some of America’s most famous brands. And just last month, the Iowa Senate passed a bill allowing minors under the age of 14 to work night shifts. And states like Missouri, Minnesota and Ohio are considering bills that would allow teenagers to work long hours in jobs previously considered too dangerous for children of that age.
And behind efforts to reduce protections at the state level is this conservative think tank and lobbying group based in Florida. The Washington Post’s business reporter Jacob Bogge is reporting on the matter and will join us later to discuss his findings. Let’s start with New York Times investigative reporter Hannah Dryer. She has been covering child labor exploitation across the country for the past year and has spoken to more than 100 immigrant children in 20 states who are working in violation of child labor laws. And she recorded these interviews yesterday.
Gross: Well, Tonya, let me say it again, it’s an honor to have you as a co-host of the show. Now listen to the interview.
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