Miguel Marquez is a CNN senior national correspondent that has worked in broadcast journalism for 25 years. He and Brad discuss covering difficult stories from around the world and if being gay has affected his career. He has covered many difficult stories such as the Iraq War, the War in Afghanistan, the Bahrain riots, and domestic clashes. Most recently, as a reporter, he documented the heartbreaking stories of the pandemic in hospitals in New York and Texas. Despite the challenges of reporting on such a chaotic and random enemy, Miguel Marquez shares the importance of allowing people to tell their stories and respecting their opinions even if he didn’t agree with them.
“Giving voice to the voiceless and covering those stories is incredibly important – there are people who have died doing that.” – Miguel Marquez
In this episode you’ll learn:
- Miguel Marquez’s experience reporting on the pandemic in US hospitals
- Objectivity versus subjectivity in reporting on protests against COVID-19 mandates
- Coming out in the professional environment and the challenges it poses.
Follow Miguel on Twitter: @miguelmarquez
The award-winning reporter has broken news and covered several big stories both domestically and internationally. Miguel Marquez reported extensively on the Covid-19 pandemic from inside overwhelmed emergency departments and hospitals in NYC at its start; to overwhelmed hospitals in Texas over the
summer; to western and rural areas rife with disease in the early autumn; to an enormous spike in cases in the winter; and finally, to the human and economic cost of the coronavirus across the US.
Marquez got extraordinary access to several hospitals including enough to report for a full hour on the horrendous situation in New York City early in the pandemic through the experience of doctors and staff at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University. Marquez has also reported extensively on politics and the political realignment throughout the country. He covered protests and voters in the 2016 election and has gone on to cover swing-voters throughout the country, with major focus on the industrial Midwest and areas that flipped from Obama in 2012 to Trump in 2016 and how they voted in 2020.
Marquez also reported extensively on the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police and the protest and aftermath that followed. He led CNN’s coverage from the midst of rioting and unrest in Baltimore in the aftermath of Freddie Gray’s death while in police custody.
In 2016, Marquez accepted a Golden Nymph Award on behalf of CNN at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival for its coverage of Baltimore in 2015
His initial start with CNN was in April 2003, as anchor for CNN Headline News based in CNN’s world headquarters in Atlanta. Marquez moved to Los Angeles to take up reporting duties for CNN in June 2003 where he covered everything from wildfires to the first Michael Jackson trial for CNN.
Before joining CNN, Marquez was a desk assistant at CBS News. His first reporting job was at WNBC in New York where he covered the daily events of the city. He moved to KSAZ in Phoenix, AZ where for three years he was a general assignment reporter.
Prior to pursuing a career in broadcast journalism, Marquez served as a legislative assistant to then US Representative Bill Richardson. Notably, while traveling to Pyongyang, North Korea as part of a
congressional delegation, two US helicopter pilots were shot down north of the de-militarized zone and Marquez assisted in negotiations for their release. Marquez’s first job was as a researcher for the Congressional Research Service in Washington, D.C.
Marquez was born in Santa Rosa, New Mexico.
