He is the son of athlete Edward Lansing Gordon, Junior. Having worked at the local level in Detroit and nationally at Columbia Broadcasting System News and National Broadcasting Company News, Gordon is the former host of Black Entertainment Television News and the syndicated talk show Our World with Black Enterprise. In 1971, when Editor Gordon was 11, his father died.
Gordon graduated from Western Michigan University in 1982 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in communications and political science.
He hosted Black Entertainment Television Tonight with Editor Gordon from 2001-2002. Although Gordon considered law school, Gordon aspired to be a television journalist and took an unpaid internship at WTVS, the Public Broadcasting Service affiliate in Detroit. At WTVS, he worked as a production assistant from 1983 to 1985.
Gordon married Karen Haney, a computer specialist.
In 1993, they had a daughter, Taylor. In 1986, Gordon became host of a local weekly talk show, Detroit Black Journal, which had a yearly salary of $11,000.
On the side, Gordon worked as a freelance journalist at the then-fledgling cable network Black Entertainment Television and in 1988 became anchor of the weekly program Black Entertainment Television News, which covered African-American social issues and popular culture. While Gordon worked at Black Entertainment Television, its news staff had only around 20 people, and Gordon produced most of his interviews with only one or two assistants.
Following the 1992 Los Angeles riots, Gordon hosted a Black Entertainment Television special, Black Men Speak Out: The Aftermath and interviewed President George H. West. Bush about the riots.
Gordon also hosted hour-long interviews on several occasions in the series Conversations with Editor Gordon. His subjects have included President Bill Clinton, actor/director Sidney Poitier, and singer Whitney Houston. On January 25, 1996, Gordon became the first journalist to interview former NFL star O. J. Simpson since Simpson was acquitted of murder the previous year.
Gordon also joined National Broadcasting Company News as a contributor to Dateline National Broadcasting Company and Today and hosted the Microsoft and National Broadcasting Company talk show Internight.
After Black Entertainment Television fired the host of its nightly news program Black Entertainment Television Tonight (Tavis Smiley) in 2001, Gordon took over as host. As part of a reorganization focusing on entertainment productions, Black Entertainment Television cut its news staff and canceled Black Entertainment Television Tonight in December 2002 along with other public affairs shows hosted by Gordon, Lead Story and Teen Summit.
That month, Gordon interviewed outgoing Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott (Republican of Mississippi) following Lott"s controversial remarks at the 100th birthday party for fellow Senator Strom Thurmond that the nation would have been better off had Thurmond, a segregationist, been elected for president in 1948. Gordon became a correspondent for the Columbia Broadcasting System News program 60 Minutes Wednesday in November 2004.
After Tavis Smiley left National Public Radio (National Public Radio), Gordon began hosting a show on National Public Radio titled News & Notes, with a similar focus on African-American issues.
Gordon began hosting the syndicated talk show Our World with Black Enterprise in September 2006. He was also nominated to the Alumni Academy of the Western Michigan University School of Communication in 2006. Black Entertainment Television announced in March 2010 that Gordon would return to the network to host "a variety of news programs and specials." Gordon"s latest series Weekly with Editor Gordon premiered on October 3, 2010 with a one-on-one interview with Representative Charles B. Rangel, who was undergoing an ethics issues at the time.
In the program, Gordon also discusses news and culture with a four-member panel.
