Steve Jones
Steve Jones is in charge of strategic planning, business development, programming and operations for ABC-branded audio content covering news, entertainment, lifestyle and sports. The ABC audio brands include America’s most-listened to network, ABC News Radio, along with iconic brands ABC Radio, ABC Sports Radio and a growing suite of digital audio and text businesses marketed as ABC Radio Digital.
ABC News Radio reaches more than 73-million listeners each week and is affiliated on over 1,650 radio stations. Beyond broadcast radio, ABC produces content for digital radio companies, satellite radio, wireless carriers, websites and radio partners around the globe. ABC Radio Digital syndicates written news, entertainment and lifestyle stories to over 600 radio websites and major brand portals.
Under Jones’ leadership, ABC News Radio has received some of the highest honors in broadcasting including more than a dozen Edward R. Murrow Awards, 10 International Radio Festival Awards, five National Headliner Awards and three New York Festivals Awards. Jones was twice named by the readers of Radio & Records as News Executive of the Year. In 2017, Jones received the RTDNF First Amendment Service Award.
Prior to leading ABC News Radio, Jones was the vice president for Programming and Operations for ABCNews.com during which time he oversaw all content and production. Under his leadership, the ABCNews.com team won multiple awards, including an Edward R. Murrow Award for Best Network News website and a Peabody Award for ABCNews.com’s coverage of the 2001 terror attacks. Jones also launched the first regularly scheduled webcast by a network, oversaw the launch of interactive web programming and co-produced ABC’s online millennium coverage and other special event programming.
Jones joined ABC News Radio in 1986 as a writer and editor covering a wide range of major news stories, including the Iran-Contra affair and the first Gulf War. In 1994, he began producing ABC News Radio’s documentary, long-form and series programming. During this period his work won two Writers Guild of America (WGA) Awards and an Overseas Press Club Award.
In 1996, Jones was named senior producer responsible for major breaking news coverage and soon developed ABC News for Kids and ESPN Sports for Kids. Two years later he was promoted to director of News and Entertainment Programming, overseeing a staff producing news and feature content. During this period he led the effort to develop multiple websites for the daily delivery of ABC News and ABC Radio Networks’ text and audio to its affiliates.
Prior to joining ABC News, Jones was a radio newscaster and disc jockey on several stations, including WXRK-FM (K-Rock), New York, WLIR/Long Island and WPIX/New York. He also has worked as television reporter for Cablevision’s News 12/Long Island.
Jones was a 2010 Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism Fellow in the Sulzberger Executive Leadership Program. He has an undergraduate degree from Adelphi University. He lives in Armonk, New York, with his wife and two children.
