Terrell J. Starr
GRANTEE
Terrell J. Starr is probably one of the few foreign affairs reporters who compares diplomacy to the narcotics trade. In fact, one of his most popular columns compared Russian President Vladimir Putin to fictional drug lord Marlo Stanfield, a character on the HBO series The Wire.
That’s Starr’s approach to foreign affairs news: making things simple and relatable to the everyday person. His work focuses on U.S. domestic politics, race in the U.S. and abroad, Eastern European affairs, and other foreign policy issues.
On his Black Diplomats YouTube channel, he delivers documentary-style video reporting about civilian life in war-time Ukraine. For his political analysis, you can check out his newsletter, also called Black Diplomats.
Starr’s 16 years in journalism include stints as Fusion’s national political correspondent covering the 2016 presidential campaign. Previously, he was a senior reporter at Foxtrot Alpha, a website that focuses on the military, technology, and policy. He is also a contributor to Foreign Policy magazine, The Washington Post, Outrider, and O, The Oprah Magazine.
He was in Kyiv when the Russian invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, and his live, on-the-ground video stories for networks such CNN, MSNBC, and Al Jazeera introduced his style of reporting to millions of people around the globe.
Starr was a Peace Corps volunteer in Georgia from 2003 to 2005. He lived in Ukraine as a Fulbright fellow and a freelance journalist from 2009 to 2010, during which time he produced a photojournalism project on the lives of Black Ukrainians.
He has a master’s degree in Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies. He has a second master’s in Journalism. He earned his bachelor’s degree in English at Philander Smith College, a historically Black college in Little Rock, Arkansas.
While Starr is based in Brooklyn, New York, he spends much of his time in Ukraine and regularly travels to Central Asia and Western Europe for reporting assignments.
