Allen Media Group Signs Veteran White House Journalist April Ryan

Allen Media Group’s new over-the-air 24/7 broadcast television network TheGrio.TV has hired veteran Washington correspondent April Ryan in the dual role of White House correspondent and Washington bureau chief.

Ryan will begin her new position on Jan. 4, 2021. Joe Biden will be the fifth U.S. president Ryan has covered since she began her career as a White House correspondent 24 years ago.

Ryan, a frequent contributor to CNN, is a Baltimore native and Morgan State University graduate. She has served on the board of the White House Correspondents Association and is one of only four African Americans in the Association’s more than 100-year history to serve on its board. She is also a member of the National Press Club.

In 2015, Ryan was nominated for an NAACP Image Award for her first book, The Presidency in Black and White: My Up-Close View of Four Presidents and Race in America. Shortly after, she became the 2017 National Association of Black Journalists’ Journalist of the Year.

In 2017, Ryan also received the She Persisted Award from the Women’s Media Center. She was recognized as the 2019 Freedom of the Press Award winner by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press.

TheGrio.TV television network officially launches on January 15, 2021 — the start of the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday weekend. The newly-rebranded broadcast television network TheGrio.TV will feature African American-focused content reaching over 100 million U.S. households via over-the-air broadcast television stations, cable/telco/satellite platforms, and free digital streaming.

TheGrio.TV recently added broadcast television station subchannel distribution with Fox owned-and-operated television stations in 11 major markets: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Dallas, San Francisco, Houston, Atlanta, Phoenix, Minneapolis, and Orlando. These eleven U.S. television markets represent 29.6% of general market households and 36.3% of African-American households.