Monique Ming Laven, KIRO 7 News

Monique Ming Laven co-anchors KIRO 7 News at 5pm, 6pm, 7pm, and 11pm, Monday through Friday alongside Dave Wagner. Monique joined KIRO 7 News in June of 2006 and has covered a wide range of stories during her tenure, including the 2009 trial of Amanda Knox in Perugia, Italy. KIRO 7’s coverage received an Emmy Award and a National Headliner Award for Breaking News. Monique has been on the desk for some of Western Washington’s biggest news stories, including extended coverage during the Lakewood police officers’ shootings, the murder of Seattle police officer Timothy Brenton and the shootings at Marysville Pilchuck High School. She also anchored coverage of a holiday season shooting at Westfield Southcenter for which KIRO 7 received an Emmy Award and National Headliner Award for Best Newscast. Before joining the KIRO 7 team, Monique worked as evening anchor and reporter at WCMH in Columbus, OH, WKOW in Madison, WI, and 6News in Lawrence, KS. During her time in the Midwest she was in key swing states for the presidential elections in 2004 and 2008, she traveled to New York City to cover the September 11th terrorist attacks, and she biked 560 miles in six days from Minneapolis to Chicago reporting on the Heartland AIDS Ride. During her Midwest tour of duty, she also picked up an Edward R. Murrow Award for Best News Series and the Associated Press Award for Best Documentary. Monique has made a practice of living in cities with universities (Kansas Jayhawks, Wisconsin Badgers, Ohio State Buckeyes), but this is the first time she's settled into the turf of a Pac-12 rival: she is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of University of California, Berkeley. One of her favorite memories is watching the Battle for the Roses game between Cal and UW. Although the Huskies pulled it out, she cherished cheering on Cal alongside her grandfather, another Golden Bear and her favorite game day date. Often the highlight of her week comes in the car. She's a volunteer driver for Sound Generations (formerly King County Senior Services), and those seniors share a lot of memories, a lot of laughs, and a lot of wisdom. Monique lives in Seattle with her husband and their puppy MeiMei.