NEW YORK: Pakistani American Journalist Amna Nawaz makes history in theUnited States Presidential election.
Amna Nawaz, an upcoming Pakistani-American journalist, has been selected tomoderate a US presidential debate, the first woman of South Asian origin towin this honour, according to media reports.
Ms. Nawaz, 40, a senior correspondent for the Public Broadcasting Servicenews programme “NewsHour” senior national correspondent, along with JudyWoodruff, PBS anchor and managing editor, and colleague PBS NewHour WhiteHouse correspondent Yamiche Alcindor, and Politico chief politicalcorrespondent Tim Alberta, will co-moderate the sixth Democratic primarydebate, scheduled for Dec. 19 at Loyola Marymount University in LosAngeles, California.
Amna is the daughter of Shuja Nawaz, a former Pakistan Television (PTV)journalist and currently a Distinguished Fellow, South Asia Center, atAtlantic Council, a Washington-based think-tank.
Ms. Nawaz, who joined PBS NewsHour in April 2018, besides serving as itssenior national correspondent is also its primary substitute anchor.
Prior to joining the NewsHour, Nawaz was an anchor and correspondent at ABCNews, anchoring breaking news coverage and leading the network’s digitalcoverage of the 2016 presidential election. Before that, she served as aforeign correspondent at NBC News, reporting from Pakistan, Afghanistan,Syria, Turkey, and the broader region.
She is also the founder and former managing editor of NBC’s Asian-Americaplatform, built to elevate the voices of America’s fastest-growingpopulation.
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At the NewsHour, Nawaz has reported politics, foreign affairs, education,climate change, culture and sports. Her immigration reporting has taken herto multiple border communities in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and Mexico.She’s investigated the impact of the Trump Administration’s immigrationpolicies, including following the journey of a single toddler as she lefther home in Mexico, was separated from her family at the U.S. border, andlater reunited with her family several weeks later. She also regularlycovers issues around detention, refugees and asylum, and migrant childrenin U.S. government custody.
Earlier, at NBC News, her work appeared on NBC Nightly News, The TodayShow, Dateline NBC, MSNBC, and MSNBC.com.
She was NBC’s Islamabad Bureau Chief and Correspondent for several years,and was the first foreign journalist allowed inside North Waziristan. Shecovered the Taliban attack on Malala Yousafzai, the U.S. raid on Osama binLaden’s compound, and broke news in a series of exclusive reports on theimpact of U.S. drone strikes. Ms. Nawaz reported for the network’sinvestigative unit, covering the U.S. housing crisis and the BritishPetroleum (BP) oil spill, and also covered the election and inauguration ofBarack Obama, the earthquake in Haiti, and Hurricane Katrina.
Ms. Nawaz has also been honoured with an Emmy Award for the NBC NewsSpecial “Inside the Obama White House,” a Society for Features JournalismAward, and was a recipient of the International Reporting Projectfellowship in 2009.
She’s an alumna of the University of Pennsylvania–where she earned abachelor’s degree, majoring in politics, philosophy and economics, and alsowhere she captained the varsity field hockey team—and the London School ofEconomics—from where she received her master’s degree majoring incomparative politics.
