Pat Duggins
News DirectorPat Duggins is APR’s news director. As a kid, he watched the Apollo manned moon launches along Florida’s space coast. Pat later spent 14 years covering NASA for NPR. After re-organizing the APR newsroom, he and the team were honored with over 150 awards for excellence in journalism. That includes APR being the first radio newsroom to receive RFK Human Rights’ “Seigenthaler Prize for Courage in Journalism.” Pat holds a master’s degree from the University of Alabama and has published two books on NASA. When he’s not at APR, he enjoys cooking with Lucia, and tending his beloved fig tree.
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Alabama on Wednesday asked the Supreme Court to allow it to use a congressional map favoring Republicans in this year's elections, despite a lower court's ruling that the redistricting plan intentionally discriminates against Black people. -
A Justice Department indictment against the Southern Poverty Law Center is part of a “top-down” campaign of retribution against President Donald Trump's perceived political enemies and constitutes a vindictive prosecution that must be dismissed, lawyers for the nonprofit argued in urging a judge to toss the case out. -
Clarence B. Jones, who helped argue the Alabama based U.S. Supreme Court case “New York Times v. Sullivan," has died. The civil rights activist and attorney also wrote part of the iconic “I Have A Dream” speech delivered by Doctor Martin Luther King, Junior in 1963 in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. Jones was 95. -
A three judge panel is ruling against the state of Alabama and its plans to erase a African American U.S. House seat. There’s also reportedly separate deadline associated with this case starting Tuesday. The three judges in the Northern District of Alabama, Southern Division, in Birmingham, says the state cannot use voting maps that delete the African American and Democratic District two. -
Today is Memorial Day. And for many Alabamians that means a visit to the U.S.S. Alabama Memorial Park. This year marks twenty five years since the attacks on nine eleven. The park will hold a commemoration as well as a flag lowering ceremony. Genovese Harris is with the Memorial Park. She says these events can be a poignant reminder to young people who come to visit… -
A three-judge appellate panel may soon decide the fate of four U.S. House Districts in Alabama’s mid-term election. All sides gathered in Birmingham, with the Secretary of State arguing that a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling cleared the way for legislators in special session to erase the new District 2, currently held by Democrat Shomari Figures. Critics of the state’s actions say Alabama is redrawing voting lines illegally based on race. -
A divided Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed Alabama's bid to be allowed to execute a convicted murder who was found by lower courts to be intellectually disabled. -
U.S. Congressman Barry Moore and former Navy SEAL Jared Hudson advanced to a runoff on Wednesday for the Republican nomination for the open U.S. Senate seat in Alabama. Moore is a three-term congressman endorsed by President Donald Trump and Hudson is a political newcomer. Moore said the state deserves a “Trump conservative” in the Senate, while Hudson has promised to be “a warrior for President Trump’s ‘America First’ agenda” if he is elected. -
The Stonewall National Monument, the President's House Site and the Women's Rights National Historic Park are among 11 sites on this year's annual list of the most endangered historic places in the United States compiled by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. A hotel in Montgomery made the list. -
Alabama will get a rematch between two high-profile nominees for governor while candidates of both major parties will head to runoff elections next month for an open U.S. Senate seat, and Attorney General.
