McCaskill to talk about switch to commentary during annual GJR First Amendment celebration

The Gateway Journalism Review’s 10th annual First Amendment Celebration will be Oct. 27 at 7 p.m. featuring former Mo. Sen. Claire McCaskill.  Jo Mannies, veteran St. Louis political reporter, will be asking questions about McCaskill’s switch from politics to political commentary for NBC.

McCaskill will explain the ins and outs of Senate procedures, such as the filibuster, discuss the role of a free press, comment on the upcoming Senate race in Missouri and discuss the importance of media literacy. The virtual event – “On the press, filibuster and media literacy” – occurs during U.S. Media Literacy Week.

When she left the Senate in 2019, McCaskill was the top-ranking Democrat on the Homeland Security Committee and a senior member of the Armed Services Committee. Before her election to the Senate in 2006, McCaskill was Missouri’s State Auditor and before that, the elected prosecutor of Kansas City. 

McCaskill is the only woman elected to the Senate from Missouri and the only person in the state’s history to unseat a sitting governor in a primary campaign. 

McCaskill lives in St. Louis with her husband and is a grandmother of 14. 

Mannies, who will be asking the questions, is a former political reporter for St. Louis Public Radio and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Tickets to this event are $100 a person and $75 for students.