Ashley Parker

This article is about the journalist. For the singer, see Ashley Parker Angel.
Ashley Parker
Parker in 2018
Bornc. 1983 (aged c. 41)
Bethesda, Maryland, United States
EducationUniversity of Pennsylvania (BA)
OccupationJournalist
Employers
Spouse
​
(m. 2018)​
Children1 daughter
AwardsBenjamin Franklin Scholar, Nora Magid Mentorship Prize in writing, Pulitzer Prize[1]

Ashley Rebecca Parker (born c. 1983[2]) is an American journalist, senior national political correspondent for The Washington Post,[3] and senior political analyst for MSNBC. From 2011 to 2017 she was a Washington-based[4] politics reporter[5] for The New York Times.

Personal life

Parker was born and raised in Bethesda, Maryland, by Bruce and Betty Parker. Her father is a former president of Environmental Industries Association, a Washington, D.C.–based trade organization.[6] She has lived in Bethesda for the majority of her life, except during her college years and a few years while working for The New York Times. Her immediate family still resides in the area.[7]

She married Michael C. Bender, who was at the time a White House reporter for The Wall Street Journal, on June 16, 2018.[6]

Parker and her husband have two daughters as Ashley returned to work from the birth of her 2nd daughter to the Post, in November of 2023. Her first daughter, Mazarine, was born in November 2018.[8] Parker is a stepmother to Bender's daughter from a previous marriage.[9]

Education

Parker attended Bethesda's Walt Whitman High School, where she was a member of the class of 2001.[2] She also spent part of her junior year at La Universidad de Sevilla in Spain and has a command of Spanish.

In 2005, she graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania, where she majored in English (Creative Writing concentration) and Communications.[10][11] She had been a Pulitz.[12] Parker also completed internships with The New York Sun and the Gaithersburg Gazette, which is owned by The Washington Post. She served as a features editor and writer at both 34th Street Magazine and The Daily Pennsylvanian, the independent student newspaper for the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.[13]

Career

After college at the University of Pennsylvania, Parker interned at the Gaithersburg Gazette and reported on local government, including city planning meetings.

She worked as a researcher for Maureen Dowd, a columnist for The New York Times.[14]

She appeared and continues to appear on Washington Week on PBS, and she has also written for The New York Times Magazine. She covers many Republican Party candidates, elected officials, and topics as well as[15][16] covering routine New York City topics[17] and the White House. She also covered Chelsea Clinton's wedding for The New York Times.[18]

Parker's photographs have appeared in Vanity Fair and her writing has appeared in other publications including The New York Sun, Glamour, The Huffington Post,[19] Washingtonian, Chicago Magazine and Life magazine.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Parker initially covered Jeb Bush's campaign before being moved to that of Donald Trump.[20]

She and her Post colleague Philip Rucker shared the 2017 Gerald R. Ford Journalism Prize for Distinguished Reporting on the Presidency.[21]

She was part of the reporting team at The Washington Post that, with The New York Times team, won the Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting in 2018 on coverage of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.[22][23]

On September 7, 2019, Donald Trump called Parker and Rucker in a tweet "two nasty lightweight reporters" and called for banning them from the White House.[24][25]

On November 20, 2019, Parker co-moderated the fifth Democratic Party presidential debate of the 2020 campaign, along with Rachel Maddow, Andrea Mitchell, and Kristen Welker.[9]

In January 2021, she became The Washington Post White House bureau chief.[26]

In 2021, Parker was a member of The Washington Post team that developed The Attack, a three-part online series that cited systematic security failures ahead of the January attack on the U. S. Capitol. The series won the 2021 George Polk National Reporting Award in Journalism.[27]

On May 9, 2022, she was part of The Washington Post team that received the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service.[28][29]

In July 2022, Parker became senior national political correspondent for The Washington Post.[30] In December 2024, The Atlantic announced that Parker will be joining the magazine's staff as a writer.[31]

Parker was part of the Washington Post team that won the 2024 Prize in National Reporting for its examination of the impact of the AR-15 semi-automatic rifle.[32][33][34]

References

  1. ^ The Washington Post wins 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting and for National Reporting. August 16, 2018. Washington Post
  2. ^ a b Tallman, Douglas (November 21, 2019). "Democratic Debate Moderator is a Whitman Grad". Montgomery Community Media.
  3. ^ "Ashley Parker". The Washington Post. William Lewis. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
  4. ^ LinkedIn profile page for Ashley Parker(registration required)
  5. ^ "Ashley Parker - City Room Blog - The New York Times". cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com. 15 July 2011. Retrieved 2020-11-09.
  6. ^ a b "Ashley Parker, Michael Bender". The New York Times. June 17, 2018.
  7. ^ "CPCW News". writing.upenn.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-09.
  8. ^ Sherman, Jake; Palmer, Anna; Lippman, Daniel (11 November 2018). "POLITICO Playbook: Dems lay out investigation priorities". Politico. Washington, D.C. Retrieved 10 May 2022.
  9. ^ a b Kahn, Mattie (20 November 2019). "Four Seasoned Journalists Will Moderate Tonight's Presidential Debate—They Happen to Be Women". Glamour. New York, New York. Retrieved 10 May 2022.
  10. ^ "Mighty Writers interview with Ashley Parker: Know Your (Grown Up) Mighty Writers: Ashley Parker, accessed 12/6/2014". Archived from the original on 2015-02-27. Retrieved 2014-12-07.
  11. ^ Wolk, Andy. "Alumni Visitors Series". upenn. Retrieved 11 April 2017.
  12. ^ "CPCW: Nora Magid Mentorship Prize". writing.upenn.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-09.
  13. ^ "Penn alumna makes a name for herself in journalism". The Daily Pennsylvanian. February 10, 2011. Archived from the original on April 7, 2015. Retrieved May 15, 2017.
  14. ^ "The Washington Post hires Ashley Parker from The New York Times". Poynter. 21 November 2016. Retrieved 2018-08-28.
  15. ^ Ashley Parker (July 13, 2012), "Cheneys Host Fund-Raiser for Romney in Wyoming" The New York Times "The Caucus" blog
  16. ^ Posts published by Ashley Parker (419 Results) The Politics and Government Blog of The New York Times, accessed 12/6/2014
  17. ^ Parker, A. (May 19, 2011), "J.F.K. Bus Collision Kills One. The New York Times
  18. ^ Parker, A. (July 24, 2010), "Clinton wedding is leaving some feeling left out", The New York Times
  19. ^ "Ashley Parker | HuffPost". www.huffpost.com. Retrieved 2020-11-09.
  20. ^ Klomhaus, Sam (October 8, 2021). "White House reporters speak to CMU class about their experiences". The Daily Sentinel. Grand Junction, Colorado: Seaton Publishing. p. 2.
  21. ^ "Reporting on the Presidency 2017". Gerald R. Ford Foundation. 4 June 2018. Retrieved 28 August 2021.
  22. ^ "Honoring excellence in journalism and the arts since 1917". Pulitzer Prizes. Retrieved 2020-11-09.
  23. ^ Parker, Ashley; Leonning, Carol D.; Rucker, Philip; Hamburger, Tom (July 31, 2021). "Trump dictated son's misleading statement on meeting with Russian lawyer". The Washington Post. Washington, D.C. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
  24. ^ Moran, Lee (September 7, 2019). "Donald Trump Lashes Out At Washington Post Reporters, Hints At White House Ban". Huffington Post. The Washington Post's @PhilipRucker (Mr. Off the Record) & @AshleyRParker, two nasty lightweight reporters, shouldn't even be allowed on the grounds of the White House because their reporting is so DISGUSTING & FAKE.
  25. ^ Sullivan, Claire; Jimemez, Gabby (February 16, 2023). "Washington reporters talk about covering Trump". The Eunice News. No. 14, Vol. 119. Eunice, Louisiana: Louisiana State Newspapers. p. 10. Retrieved 25 July 2024.
  26. ^ "The Washington Post announces 2021 White House team". The Washington Post. Washington, D.C. 19 January 2021. Retrieved 10 May 2022.
  27. ^ "Long Island University announces winners of 2021 George Polk Awards in Journalism" (Press release). Henderson, Tennessee: Editor & Publisher Magazine (E&P). Retrieved 2024-07-27.
  28. ^ Edmonds, Rick (9 May 2022). "An all-out reporting effort wins The Washington Post the Public Service Pulitzer for its January 6 coverage". Poynter. St. Petersburg, Florida. Retrieved 10 May 2022.
  29. ^ Parker, Ashley; Dawsey, Josh; Rucker, Philip (January 11, 2021). "Six hours of paralysis: Inside Trump's failure to act after a mob stormed the Capitol". The Washington Poat. Washington, D.C. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
  30. ^ "Ashley Parker named senior national political correspondent" (Press release). Washington, D.C.: The Washington Post. July 18, 2022. Retrieved 2024-07-26.
  31. ^ "The Atlantic Beefs Up Politics Coverage Under Trump". 2024-12-31. Archived from the original on 2025-01-01. Retrieved 2025-01-02.
  32. ^ "The 2024 Pulitzer Prize Winner in National Reporting". The Pulitzer Prizes. New York, NY: Columbia University. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  33. ^ Frankel, Todd C.; Boberg, Shawn; Dawsey, Josh; Parker, Ashley; Horton, Alex (March 27, 2023). "The gun that divides a nation". The Washington Post. Washington, D.C. Retrieved 28 July 2024.
  34. ^ Parker, Ashley; Dawsey, Josh (March 27, 2023). "A Southern town embraces its AR-15 factory". The Washington Post. Washington, D.C. Retrieved 28 July 2024.