Marc Ambinder (; born ) is an American university professor, journalist, and
television producer.
He is a former politics editor at ''
The Atlantic
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
'', a
White House Correspondent for ''
National Journal
''National Journal'' is an advisory services company based in Washington, D.C., offering services in government affairs, advocacy communications, stakeholder mapping, and policy brands research for government and business leaders. It publishes d ...
'', contributing editor for ''
GQ'', and was editor-at-large of ''
The Week''
and a member of the ''
USA Today
''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virg ...
'' national board of contributors. In 2017, he was the journalist-in-residence at the
University of Pennsylvania School of Law. His third book, ''The Brink: President Reagan and the Nuclear War Scare of 1983'', was published by Simon & Schuster in July 2018. He teaches at the
USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, where he leads Annneberg's digital security initiative.
Education
Ambinder received a A.B. in history from
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...
in 2001. He was an associate managing editor of the Harvard Crimson.
Career
In 2016, Ambinder was a Leadership Fellow at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School of Communications and Journalism. Since 2017, he has taught investigative journalism, political journalism and national security journalism. He consults for Fortune 100 companies on corporate and strategic communication. Until December 31, 2011 Ambinder was the
White House correspondent at the ''
National Journal
''National Journal'' is an advisory services company based in Washington, D.C., offering services in government affairs, advocacy communications, stakeholder mapping, and policy brands research for government and business leaders. It publishes d ...
''. He previously worked at ''
ABC News
ABC News is the journalism, news division of the American broadcast network American Broadcasting Company, ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other progra ...
'' and was chief political consultant to ''
CBS News'' from 2008 to 2011. For years, he was the author of a
political blog, ''
The Hotline''.
Though presidential politics and Washington have been his primary areas of interest, he also writes about intelligence and national security, and has
broken several stories, including details about the
raid on Osama bin Laden. His first book, "The Command: Inside The President's Secret Army," is an examination of the secretive
Joint Special Operations Command
The Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) is a joint component command of the United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) and is charged with studying special operations requirements and techniques to ensure interoperability and equ ...
.
He has secured access to the protective details of the Secret Service, broken stories about computer failures that jeopardized America’s nuclear arsenal, probed Pakistan’s fragile intelligence services, and became an authority on national security topics ranging from the
NSA and surveillance, to the government’s secret commando force, to its secretive continuity of government plans.
He has written for ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', ''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issue ...
'', ''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large n ...
'', ''
Vice'', and numerous national magazines. He has been a consulting producer and on-air expert for documentaries about special operations forces, the Secret Service and government doomsday plans. He has been a guest on every national television news network in the U.S., on the
BBC, on
Al Jazeera International
Al Jazeera English (AJE; ar, الجزيرة, translit=al-jazīrah, , literally "The Peninsula", referring to the Qatar Peninsula) is an international 24-hour English-language news channel owned by the Al Jazeera Media Network, which is own ...
and was a regular analyst on politics for
CBS News Radio.
His online journalism has won him several awards and attracted a large
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
following. He was nominated for an Emmy in 2005 and was part of a team that won a DuPont Silver Baton from Columbia University.
Gawker reported that, in 2009, Ambinder struck a deal with
Hillary Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States senat ...
spokesman
Philippe Reines to provide positive remarks on Clinton in exchange for receiving an advance copy of a Clinton speech. Gawker based its report on a fragment of an email chain they obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. Both Ambinder and Reines said that the emails lacked critical context, which showed that Ambinder did not actually make any such deal with Reines. Ambinder later said he regretted how such incidents, even when misinterpreted, contributed to the fraying of trust between political journalists and the public, and decried the proliferation of transactional reporting in Washington.
Personal
In 2010 Ambinder wrote about his experience with
bariatric surgery, which reduced his weight from 235 to 150 pounds. He is married to Michael Park, a corporate strategy consultant.
References
External links
Marc Ambinder Blog ''The Compass'' at ''The Week''*
Marc Ambinder Twitter
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ambinder, Marc
1970s births
21st-century American non-fiction writers
American male bloggers
American bloggers
American magazine editors
Harvard College alumni
American LGBT journalists
American LGBT writers
Living people
The Atlantic (magazine) people
LGBT academics
The Harvard Crimson people