Politics

/

ArcaMax

Meet the Walz-Vance debate moderators: Margaret Brennan and Norah O'Donnell

Stephen Battaglio, Los Angeles Times on

Published in Political News

LOS ANGELES — CBS News is presenting the only debate between the 2024 presidential running mates on Tuesday. Gov. Tim Walz, the Democrat from Minnesota, will face off against Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) starting at 6 p.m. (Pacific).

The candidates will be questioned by "CBS Evening News" anchor Norah O'Donnell and Margaret Brennan, who queries Washington power players each week on the Sunday public affairs program "Face the Nation." The event at the CBS Broadcast Center on Manhattan's West Side will mark the first time two women have moderated any general election presidential or vice presidential debate.

CBS is making the debate available across all cable news channels and major broadcast networks. Streaming platforms will carry it as well, including Paramount+ and the division's free service CBS News 24/7. The 90-minute debate will have two four-minute commercial breaks. Like the presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Trump, there will be no live audience.

Unlike the Sept. 10 presidential debate on ABC, the moderators will not fact-check the candidates for vice president during the proceedings on Tuesday. CBS News will provide real-time fact-checking on its live blog and on social media.

The moderators are veteran journalists with long tenures covering national politics. O'Donnell has spent her entire career in the Beltway, and both she and Brennan have served as White House correspondents for CBS. They have both traveled the world extensively covering international stories for the network as well.

The vice presidential debate in 2020, when Harris faced off against the incumbent Mike Pence, averaged 57.9 million viewers according to Nielsen. It was the second most-watched meeting of running mates in history.

Here's what else you should know about the moderators:

O'Donnell, 50, was mentored by the late "Meet the Press" moderator Tim Russert. After a stint at the newspaper Roll Call, she worked in the Washington bureau as a correspondent for NBC and reported to Russert, who was bureau chief. She said she worked her Capitol Hill sources on the phone in her car before entering the newsroom each day because she knew if he ran into him he'd ask, "What do you know?"

She did her first TV show as a 10-year-old. O'Donnell's father served as a military doctor and her family lived in several countries where he was stationed. During her years in South Korea, she hosted a program that taught English to locals.

 

She will have a new role after the election. O'Donnell is leaving the anchor chair at "CBS Evening News" after the election to become a senior correspondent focusing on long-form interviews and specials. O'Donnell will be succeeded by John Dickerson and Maurice DuBois, a local anchor at WCBS in New York.

Her big scoop: She is the first American television journalist to conduct a sit down interview with a pope. Her talk with Pope Francis aired on CBS in May.

Her husband is a top chef. O'Donnell is married to Geoff Tracy, who has two restaurants in downtown Washington, D.C., and one in Chevy Chase, Md. Food brought them together as they met in a cafeteria line when as students at Georgetown University. They married in 2001 and have three children.

Brennan, 44, started out as a business reporter. The Connecticut native and University of Virginia grad's first job was at CNBC, where she was a producer on a program hosted by financial news commentator Louis Rukeyser. She spent six years covering global financial markets at Bloomberg news before arriving at the CBS Washington bureau in 2012.

Her life changed in 2018. Brennan was named the new moderator of "Face the Nation," succeeding Dickerson on the venerable Washington-based program, shortly after she learned she was pregnant with her first child.

Her big scoop: In 2021, Brennan was the first to report that members of former President Trump's cabinet discussed invoking the 25th amendment following the Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol.

She is fluent in Arabic:Brennan was a Fulbright-Hays Scholar, she studied Arabic at Yarmouk University in Irbid, Jordan. As a college intern at CNN, she translated videotaped messages from Osama Bin Laden. Her fluency also comes in handy when she visits the relatives of her husband, Yado Yukub, a Syrian American who serves as a judge advocate in the Marine Corps.


©2024 Los Angeles Times. Visit at latimes.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

 

Comments

blog comments powered by Disqus

 

Related Channels

ACLU

ACLU

By The ACLU
Amy Goodman

Amy Goodman

By Amy Goodman
Armstrong Williams

Armstrong Williams

By Armstrong Williams
Austin Bay

Austin Bay

By Austin Bay
Ben Shapiro

Ben Shapiro

By Ben Shapiro
Betsy McCaughey

Betsy McCaughey

By Betsy McCaughey
Bill Press

Bill Press

By Bill Press
Bonnie Jean Feldkamp

Bonnie Jean Feldkamp

By Bonnie Jean Feldkamp
Cal Thomas

Cal Thomas

By Cal Thomas
Christine Flowers

Christine Flowers

By Christine Flowers
Clarence Page

Clarence Page

By Clarence Page
Danny Tyree

Danny Tyree

By Danny Tyree
David Harsanyi

David Harsanyi

By David Harsanyi
Debra Saunders

Debra Saunders

By Debra Saunders
Dennis Prager

Dennis Prager

By Dennis Prager
Dick Polman

Dick Polman

By Dick Polman
Erick Erickson

Erick Erickson

By Erick Erickson
Froma Harrop

Froma Harrop

By Froma Harrop
Jacob Sullum

Jacob Sullum

By Jacob Sullum
Jamie Stiehm

Jamie Stiehm

By Jamie Stiehm
Jeff Robbins

Jeff Robbins

By Jeff Robbins
Jessica Johnson

Jessica Johnson

By Jessica Johnson
Jim Hightower

Jim Hightower

By Jim Hightower
Joe Conason

Joe Conason

By Joe Conason
Joe Guzzardi

Joe Guzzardi

By Joe Guzzardi
John Micek

John Micek

By John Micek
John Stossel

John Stossel

By John Stossel
Josh Hammer

Josh Hammer

By Josh Hammer
Judge Andrew Napolitano

Judge Andrew Napolitano

By Judge Andrew P. Napolitano
Laura Hollis

Laura Hollis

By Laura Hollis
Marc Munroe Dion

Marc Munroe Dion

By Marc Munroe Dion
Michael Barone

Michael Barone

By Michael Barone
Michael Reagan

Michael Reagan

By Michael Reagan
Mona Charen

Mona Charen

By Mona Charen
Oliver North and David L. Goetsch

Oliver North and David L. Goetsch

By Oliver North and David L. Goetsch
R. Emmett Tyrrell

R. Emmett Tyrrell

By R. Emmett Tyrrell
Rachel Marsden

Rachel Marsden

By Rachel Marsden
Rich Lowry

Rich Lowry

By Rich Lowry
Robert B. Reich

Robert B. Reich

By Robert B. Reich
Ruben Navarrett Jr

Ruben Navarrett Jr

By Ruben Navarrett Jr.
Ruth Marcus

Ruth Marcus

By Ruth Marcus
S.E. Cupp

S.E. Cupp

By S.E. Cupp
Salena Zito

Salena Zito

By Salena Zito
Star Parker

Star Parker

By Star Parker
Stephen Moore

Stephen Moore

By Stephen Moore
Susan Estrich

Susan Estrich

By Susan Estrich
Ted Rall

Ted Rall

By Ted Rall
Terence P. Jeffrey

Terence P. Jeffrey

By Terence P. Jeffrey
Tim Graham

Tim Graham

By Tim Graham
Tom Purcell

Tom Purcell

By Tom Purcell
Veronique de Rugy

Veronique de Rugy

By Veronique de Rugy
Victor Joecks

Victor Joecks

By Victor Joecks
Wayne Allyn Root

Wayne Allyn Root

By Wayne Allyn Root

Comics

Gary Varvel Christopher Weyant Jeff Koterba Michael Ramirez John Deering Taylor Jones