Martha Raddatz

Martha Raddatz was named Senior Foreign Affairs correspondent for ABC News in November 2008, after serving as White House correspondent during the last term of President... Read More »

Martha Raddatz was named Senior Foreign Affairs correspondent for ABC News in November 2008, after serving as White House correspondent during the last term of President George W. Bush's administration. In addition to covering the day-to-day foreign and domesticstories from the White House, Raddatz has traveled from Haiti to Yemen to the Mideast and through south Asia.

Raddatz has traveled to Pakistan and Afghanistan dozens of times, and to Iraq 21 times to cover the ongoing conflict. She was on the last convoy out of Iraq and is the only television reporter allowed to cover a combat mission over Afghanistan in an F15 fighter jet, spending nearly 10 hours in the air on two separate missions. In the early hours of June 8,2006, she was the first correspondent to report that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, had been killed in a U.S. air strike north of Baghdad. In 2011 she reported exclusive details on the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden. That same year she had an exclusive interview on the USS Kearsage off the coast of Libya with the Marines who helped rescue two American pilots who had gone down in Libya. In 2012, Raddatz was on a USS destroyer as it made its way through the Strait of Hormuz.

In October 2012, Raddatz moderated the only Vice Presidential debate between Congressman Paul Ryan and Vice President Joe Biden, which covered both domestic and foreign topics. Post-debate Raddatz received an outpouring of praise for asking pointed questions on a range of issues while asserting control over the conversation.

Raddatz joined ABC News in January, 1999 as the network's State Department correspondent. There she covered the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, as well as traveled to Africa, Pakistan and India with then U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell. Her coverage at the State Department after the attacks of September 11 was recognized, along with that of other ABC News recipients, with a Peabody Award as well as an Emmy Award.

In May of 2004, Raddatz was named Senior National Security correspondent. During her time at the Pentagon, she reported exclusively on a number of stories, including the near capture of al-Zarqawi in April 2005, plus the discovery of his laptop computer. She also broke the story that the attack on a U.S. military dining hall in Mosul, Iraq in December 2004 was the work of a suicide bomber.

From 1993-1998 Raddatz was the Pentagon correspondent for National Public Radio (NPR), where she reported on foreign policy, defense and intelligence issues. During her tenure at NPR, she madenumerous trips to Eastern Europe to cover the war in Bosnia. Prior to joining NPR in 1993, she was the chief correspondent at the ABC News Boston affiliate WCVB-TV. In addition to covering several Presidential campaigns, she reported from the former Soviet Union, Africa, the Middle East, the Philippines and Europe.

In 2012 Raddatz received the First Amendment Award from the Radio Television Digital News Foundation (RTDNF) for excellence in journalism as well as the prestigious Fred Friendly First Amendment Award. She received four Emmy Awards, including an Emmy for being on the team covering the inauguration of Barack Obama. She was also the recipient the 2007 International Urbino Press Award, the 2005 Daniel Pearl Award from the Chicago Journalists Association, and a 1996 Overseas Press Club Award for her live coverage of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. In 2007 the White House Correspondents' Association awarded her the Merriman Smith Memorial Award for excellence in Presidential news coverage under deadline pressure. Her reporting was also recognized with the National Headliner Award for team coverage of the 1988 Presidential campaign.

Raddatz is the author of The Long Road Home—a Story of War and Family, a highly acclaimed book was released in March of 2007 that made both the New York Times and Washington Post bestseller lists. The Washington Post described the book as "a masterpiece of literary non-fiction that rivals any war-related classic that has preceded it." Raddatz is also a frequent guest on PBS's "Washington Week" and "Charlie Rose."