Janelle Rodriguez

Janelle Rodriguez is NBC News’ Executive Vice President of Programming, overseeing the network’s 24/7 streaming news network NBC News NOW, NBC Nightly News and NBC News’ breaking news and specials team. Rodriguez joined NBC News in January 2015.   

Under Rodriguez’s leadership, NBC News NOW has become the fastest-growing streaming news network in the U.S. Each year, NBC News NOW has delivered double-digit growth and finished 2024 as its best year ever. Distributed across more than 20 platforms, as well as internationally, NBC News NOW recently expanded with linear distribution and launched its afternoon news program, NBC News Daily, on NBC, which is now the #1 afternoon news program on television.   

She produced and oversaw NBC News’ special “Decision 2024” programming throughout the 2024 political cycle, which included Election Night, Republican National Convention, Democratic National Convention, Super Tuesday and other primary night specials. Several of the broadcast network specials were #1 among broadcast and the 40+ straight live hours of election coverage on NBC News NOW delivered the streaming network’s largest audience ever and most-watched day on record with over 100 million views. 

Additionally, NBC Nightly News, a premier destination on linear for news and information, has been a top five program on all of television each week and is drawing its largest shares of the key A25-54 demo and total viewers in five years.  

Before joining NBC News, Rodriguez served as Vice President of Programming for CNN, where she led all dayside and weekend programming for the network. At CNN, she was credited with directing award-winning coverage of many breaking news events and for driving greater collaboration. Variety honored Rodriguez as a Daytime TV Impact Honoree in 2013.   

Rodriguez has won five Emmy Awards for coverage of January 6, Election Night and Hosni Mubarak stepping down as President of Egypt in 2011. She also earned Peabody Awards for reporting of the Gulf Oil Spill, the 2008 presidential primary campaigns, and for coverage of Hurricane Katrina and was part of the CNN team that won an Alfred I. DuPont Award for coverage of the tsunami in Southeast Asia in 2005.  Rodriguez led all of CNN’s cross-platform coverage of the 2011 Royal Wedding, resulting in a Shorty Award for Best Use of Video in a Social Media Campaign.  

Rodriguez holds a Bachelor’s degree in Rhetoric from the University of California, Berkeley and a Master of Fine Arts degree in Film Production from San Francisco State University.