Karen Lincoln Michel

Karen Lincoln Michel is President and CEO of IndiJ Public Media, a nonprofit news organization that covers the Indigenous world through a digital news site and a weekday newscast. Based in Wisconsin, Karen leads the business operations of the company, which owns ICT (formerly Indian Country Today), located in Phoenix, Arizona. Previously she served as publisher and editor of Madison Magazine and is a past board president of the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism. She is a former executive editor of The Daily Advertiser in Lafayette, Louisiana, and a former assistant managing editor of the Green Bay Press-Gazette. Karen started in newspapers at the La Crosse Tribune in Wisconsin and later became a staff writer for The Dallas Morning News. She has written extensively about Native American issues as a freelancer and was a columnist for The New York Times Syndicate. She is a past president of the Native American Journalists Association, past president of UNITY: Journalists of Color, serves as chairwoman of the IndiJ Public Media Board of Directors and is a member of the Friends Board of PBS Wisconsin. She has a bachelor’s degree in industrial technology from the University of Wisconsin-Stout, a master’s degree in journalism from Marquette University, and was awarded an honorary doctorate degree in humane letters from Marquette in 2023.