Chips Quinn Reporter Spotlight: Dominique LaVigne
Posting: Tuesday, September 22, 2026
Dominique LaVigne, a reporter and weekend weather anchor at FOX5/KUSI News in San Diego, has built her journalism career around a simple aim: making sure her community sees itself represented on screen, honestly and completely. That aim took root in childhood mornings spent watching the news with her father, and it now shapes her reporting that ranges from cultural features across San Diego to some of the hardest stories a family can live through.
LaVigne grew up outside Chicago, where she and her father would flip through the channels together every morning before school, taking in local and national news side by side. She said that routine gave her a broad view of the world early on and sparked her interest in television news. As a woman of Black and Puerto Rican descent, she said she also wanted her work to represent minority communities fairly in the media.
Reaching that goal began in high school, where a broadcast teacher introduced her to the fundamentals of the craft, including how to write for TV and ask strong questions on camera. She also learned to shoot her own footage there, a skill she said gave her an advantage once she enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin where she was able to work more closely with her professors and develop her own voice as a storyteller.
Dominique LaVigne
Chips Quinn Reporter
LaVigne now works as the only Black and Puerto Rican woman in her newsroom, a position she said comes with a responsibility to highlight cultural stories across San Diego. She gravitates toward conversations with local business owners, museum volunteers and other community members, work she said shows viewers that San Diegans may differ culturally but share more common ground than they might expect, and that being part of a minority community carries joy as well as hardship. She is also drawn to stories about families facing the hardest moments of their lives, coverage she has called difficult but necessary for giving a voice to people who need it most.
One project stands out to her above the rest. LaVigne produced “Surviving Sex Trafficking,” a 30-minute special on human trafficking in California’s Central Valley. Working as a multimedia journalist, she spent months on the piece, interviewing three trafficking survivors, riding along with Bakersfield police during a canvass of an area known for trafficking activity and speaking with a county trafficking advocate and a lawmaker pushing for harsher penalties against offenders. The special reached thousands of viewers and even earned an Emmy nomination, though LaVigne said that recognition is not what made her proudest of the work. After one of the survivors watched the special, she told LaVigne she was moved to tears seeing her story told with such care. LaVigne later brought her to the Emmy ceremony, calling it a privilege to watch the survivor realize that her story had mattered so much.
Why Join the Chips Quinn Fellowship?
LaVigne applied to the Chips Quinn Fellowship because she wanted a dedicated mentor to help her keep growing as a journalist. She said she believes it is her responsibility to tell every story well, and that mentorship felt like the right way to keep building her skills for the benefit of her newsroom and the community she serves.
Looking ahead, LaVigne said she hopes to look back on the fellowship and see real growth in her writing and storytelling. She also wants to build a stronger presence online that keeps her connected to her community beyond her daily assignments, saying those connections, in person and online, help her understand what matters most to the people she covers.
Advice for Aspiring Journalists
LaVigne’s advice to aspiring journalists is hopeful: “People will tell you the industry is dying, or it’s not worth pursuing, but I argue that it is worth it,” she said. “If I can make a difference in just one person’s life over the course of my career, I’d call that a win.”
Message from her mentor:
“Dominique is a bright, focused, compassionate journalist who cares very much about the health of her community. She's a stable force in her own work, newsroom and field and works diligently to not only offer consistency, but ideas on how to add to the viewers experience through knowledge and information that includes people if all backgrounds."
Jordannah Elizabeth Graham-Mayer
Started by Freedom Forum, the original Chips Quinn program helped put college interns into newsrooms across the country. Since its beginnings in 1991, the program has reached more than 1,400 people, many of whom are now in leadership positions for local and national newsrooms. Today, the program aims to offer support to early-career journalists already in their respective newsrooms through a 1:1 mentorship by leading members in the journalism field as well as alumni from the program. Thanks to continued support for the program from Freedom Forum, each Chips Quinn Reporter receives a $10,000 stipend..
About Freedom Forum: Established on July 4, 1991, by USA TODAY founder Al Neuharth, the Freedom Forum is a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) foundation dedicated to fostering First Amendment freedoms for all. As the nation’s foremost advocate for First Amendment freedoms, the Freedom Forum engages thousands of Americans each year in classes, conversations and celebrations of these essential rights, including through the Power Shift Project, the annual Al Neuharth Free Spirit and Journalism Conference, the Chips Quinn Scholars Program for Diversity in Journalism, the Al Neuharth Award for Excellence in the Media, the Free Expression Awards, the annual “Where America Stands” survey, the Journalists Memorial and Today’s Front Pages.
About JFP: The mission of Journalism Funding Partners is to strengthen the depth, diversity and sustainability of local news by building and shepherding relationships between funders and local news organizations. JFP is a recognized nonprofit that acts as fiscal sponsor, allowing foundations and individual funders to contribute directly to local news, regardless of the news organization’s business model. JFP manages the funds feeding numerous news initiatives, including more than a dozen Climate reporters in the Southeast, an Equity Desk at The Sacramento Bee, an Education and Economic Mobility Desk in California’s Central Valley, the Investigative Fund of The Miami Herald and for Inclusivity and Investigative funds at the Associated Press.
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Media Contact: Rusty Coats, Executive Director | rusty@jfp-local.org | (813) 277-8959
