Benjamin Sampair Tracy (born July 16, 1976, in St. Paul, Minnesota) is an American journalist known for his work as a national correspondent for

CBS News CBS News is the news division of the American television and radio broadcaster CBS. It is headquartered in New York City. CBS News television programs include ''CBS Evening News'', ''CBS Mornings'', news magazine programs ''CBS News Sunday Morn ...

from January 2008 until September 2024. He served as CBS's White House correspondent from 2019 to 2020, and was the network's senior environmental correspondent, based in Los Angeles.

Early life and education

Tracy was born in St. Paul, Minnesota. He graduated from St. Thomas Academy, and later from Marquette University with Bachelor's degrees in broadcast journalism and political science, and with a Master's degree in public service.

Career

Tracy was a reporter for WCCO-TV, the CBS-affiliate station in

Minneapolis Minneapolis is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 429,954 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the state's List of cities in Minnesota, most populous city. Locat ...

, where he was a member of the station's investigative team, covering many major stories, including the

methamphetamine Methamphetamine (contracted from ) is a potent central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is mainly used as a recreational drug use, recreational or Performance-enhancing substance, performance-enhancing drug and less commonly as a secon ...

epidemic and the collapse of the 35W bridge. During that time, he also was a contributor to the '' Saturday Early Show'', to which he brought his signature "Good Question" segment, started at WCCO-TV, to a national audience. Tracy also reported for the ''

CBS Evening News The ''CBS Evening News'' is the flagship evening News broadcasting#Television, television news program of CBS News, the news division of the CBS television network in the United States. The ''CBS Evening News'' is a daily evening broadcast featu ...

with Katie Couric'' on the collapse of the I-35W bridge and flooding in southern Minnesota. Before joining WCCO-TV, Tracy worked as a reporter at WISN-TV Milwaukee and WBAY-TV Green Bay, Wisconsin. He is the recipient of five

Emmy Awards The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award categor ...

and the Alfred DuPont-Columbia award for excellence in broadcast journalism.

Controversy

On October 5, 2020, Tracy criticized the lack of adherence he observed at the Trump White House to public health guidelines to slow the spread of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

"I felt safer reporting in

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders China and Russia to the north at the Yalu River, Yalu (Amnok) an ...

than I currently do reporting at The White House. This is just crazy. For context folks, this is in reference to the COVID-19 outbreak at The White House." The tweet garnered nearly 195,000 "Likes", as well as swift criticism from Republicans.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Tracy, Ben 1976 births American television reporters and correspondents CBS News people Environmental journalists Living people Marquette University alumni Mass media people from Saint Paul, Minnesota