--- description: Find out how Steve Kornacki is shaping the future and defining the next generation of leadership. title: 2021 TIME100 Next: Steve Kornacki image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt285083f697aa7f15/698a171486f68e59c56efb79/time100-next-Steve-Kornacki.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- Feb 17, 2021 # Steve Kornacki by Rachel Maddow  Steve Kornacki, American political journalist and television host on Super Tuesday, March 3, 2020 at the MSNBC studios in New York City. Steve Kornacki, American political journalist and television host on Super Tuesday, March 3, 2020 at the MSNBC studios in New York City.David Williams—Redux It’s one of those screws with the + sign on the head, and you don’t have one of those screwdrivers. What do you do? Find a little flathead straight screwdriver and try to fit it into one of the grooves? Maybe that will work? Package needs opening. Hmm. Butter knife? Bottle cap? Teeth! We’ve all done it. The makeshift, might work approach. But there comes a point in life where you come to value the safety and satisfaction of applying the right tool to the job. NBC and MSNBC national political correspondent Steve Kornacki was put on this earth to process political data, synthesize it in his head and explain it to the rest of us—flawlessly, live, for hours on end and with next to no sleep—as we saw during the [2020 presidential election](https://time.com/tag/2020-election/ "undefined"). All of us in the news business are capable of regurgitating election results from this or that precinct, and maybe even putting those numbers in some context. But Kornacki is better at it than all of us combined. To be in the studio with him while he is running full tilt is an awe-inspiring, humbling thing. More than anyone else I’ve ever seen work, he is the master of his task. _Maddow hosts_ The Rachel Maddow Show _on MSNBC_ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-next-2021/5937746/steve-kornacki/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-next-2021/5937746/steve-kornacki/"},"headline":"Steve Kornacki","datePublished":"2021-02-17T01:13:05.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-02T23:47:58.119Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/time100-next-2021/5937746/steve-kornacki/","keywords":["list","franchise","TIME 100 Next"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt285083f697aa7f15/698a171486f68e59c56efb79/time100-next-Steve-Kornacki.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"creator":"TIME Staff","articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt285083f697aa7f15/698a171486f68e59c56efb79/time100-next-Steve-Kornacki.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-next-2021/5937746/steve-kornacki/","name":"Steve Kornacki"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"10 Questions With MSNBC's Steve Kornacki","description":"TIME's Abby Vesoulis interviews NBC National Political Correspondent Steve Kornacki about his rise to internet fame during the 2020 Presidential Election.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/UTf9pqwc/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2020-11-11T21:38:11.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/UTf9pqwc.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/collections/time100-next-2021/5937746/steve-kornacki/","duration":"PT2M56S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/collections/time100-next-2021/5937746/steve-kornacki/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```