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CHIP REID WILL JOIN CBS NEWS AS ITS CAPITOL HILL CORRESPONDENT SHARYL ATTKISSON WILL BECOME A CBS NEWS INVESTIGATIVE CORRESPONDENT
Chip Reid, who has covered Congress since fall 2004 for NBC News, will join CBS News as its Capitol Hill correspondent, it was announced by Sean McManus, President, CBS News and Sports. Reid's new assignment begins on Sept. 4.
At the same time, Sharyl Attkisson, who has covered Capitol Hill for the past year and a half, will continue to be based in Washington, D.C., as an Investigative Correspondent focusing on government spending and taxpayer issues, primarily for the "Eye on Your Money" franchise of the CBS EVENING NEWS WITH KATIE COURIC.
"Chip's experience is deep and broad, and his journalism is first-rate," said McManus. "He has covered just about every primary beat in Washington, including Capitol Hill, as well as some of the biggest stories of our time -- 9/11 from Ground Zero and the war in Iraq as an embedded correspondent. Chip strengthens an already strong Washington bureau for CBS News.
"Sharyl brought her hard-nosed reporting and inside-the-Beltway expertise to the Hill and made our coverage significantly stronger," added McManus, "but her passion always has been and always will be investigative work. I'm happy for her-and for CBS News-that she will be able to pursue those important stories again; our broadcasts and viewers will be greatly served by this move."
Reid has covered the Senate and the House of Representatives for NBC News since fall 2004, and has reported for all major NBC News broadcasts, as well as MSNBC, where he also anchored political coverage.
Before that, he was based in Los Angeles for NBC (2001-03). During that time, he was embedded for seven weeks with a lead unit of the U.S. Marines during the initial march of U.S troops from Kuwait to Baghdad. After the attacks of Sept. 11, Reid reported from Ground Zero and from the Pentagon, and followed that with stories on the war on terror from datelines around the world, including Afghanistan, Israel, Uzbekistan and Egypt. He also covered domestic stories in the western U.S., including wildfires and politics.
Reid was based in Washington, D.C. for NBC (1996-2000), where he covered Al Gore's 2000 Presidential campaign--and the fallout from the voting irregularities--and the impeachment of President Clinton, as well as many other Beltway stories.
Before joining NBC, Reid was a reporter at WJLA-TV (1994-96) and WTTG-TV (1990-93) in Washington. His career in broadcast journalism began at ABC News as a field producer in Washington (1988-89).
Previously, Reid practiced law, first as Counsel to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee (1982-86) and then as a litigation and lobbying specialist at a major Washington, D.C. law firm (1986-88).
He was born in Wilmington, Del. Reid was graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Vassar College in 1977 with a degree in psychology, from Princeton University in 1982 with a Master's of Public Affairs and from Columbia Law School in 1982 with a law degree. He lives in Washington, D.C. with his wife.
Attkisson was named CBS News' Capitol Hill Correspondent in February 2006.
Before that, she reported many award-winning investigative pieces that have uncovered theft, fraud and mismanagement within various companies and organizations including Firestone, Enron, the Red Cross and Los Alamos Weapons Laboratory, among others. Attkisson uncovered exclusive information about the dangers of prescription drugs and was the first to report that the FDA was investigating links between Viagra and blindness. She is also one of the few journalists to have flown in a B-52 on a combat mission in Kosovo and in an F-15 fighter jet Combat Air Patrol flight after Sept. 11.
Attkisson was part of the CBS News team that received the RTNDA-Edward R. Murrow Award in 2005 for Overall Excellence. She also received an Emmy Award (2002) for Outstanding Investigative Journalism for her series of reports about the Red Cross.
Attkisson has been a Washington-based correspondent for CBS News since January 1995. She joined CBS News as a co-anchor of UP TO THE MINUTE, its overnight broadcast, in September 1993, for which she was based in New York. In addition to her CBS News duties, Attkisson hosted "HealthWeek," a half-hour weekly news magazine on PBS (1996-2001).
Prior to joining CBS News, she was an anchor and correspondent for CNN (1990-93). Attkisson was an anchor and reporter at WTVT Tampa (1986-90), WBNS-TV, the CBS affiliate in Columbus, Ohio (1985-86), and WTVX-TV Fort Pierce/West Palm Beach, Fla. (1982-85). She began her broadcast journalism career in 1982 as a reporter at WUFT-TV, the PBS station in Gainesville, Fla.
Attkisson was born in Sarasota, Fla. She was graduated from the University of Florida in 1982 with a bachelor's degree in broadcast journalism. In 1997, Attkisson received the University's Alumnae of Outstanding Achievement Award, honoring just 47 women who had attended the university since it opened. She co-authored Writing Right for Broadcast and Internet News (Allyn & Bacon, 2003), a textbook used by many college journalism programs. Attkisson and her husband live in Northern Virginia with their daughter.