Sonya Ross is the founder of the digital media startup Black Women Unmuted. Sonya launched BWU after a 33-year career at The Associated Press, during which she became The AP’s first Black woman White House reporter and the first Black woman elected to the White House Correspondents Association board.
Sonya was the pool reporter aboard Air Force One when President George W. Bush was evacuated during the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. In 2010, she established specialty race & ethnicity coverage for AP that transformed the media’s approach to newsgathering about race.
Sonya was inducted into the Society of Professional Journalists Hall of Fame in 2018. The founding chair of the National Association of Black Journalists’ political reporting task force, Sonya serves on the boards of the Washington Press Club Foundation, the SPJ Foundation and the National Newspaper Publishers Association Fund. She is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.
