John Roberts (journalist)

John Roberts
Roberts in 2004
Born	John D. Roberts (1956-11-15) November 15, 1956 Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Other names	J. D. Roberts
Education	University of Toronto at Mississauga, 1978
Occupation	News reporter, television anchor, journalist
Years active	1977–present

John D. Roberts (born November 15, 1956) is a Canadian-born television journalist for the Fox News Channel as a national correspondent based in Atlanta.

He joined Fox News in January 2011. Prior to Fox News, Roberts was at CNN where he was a reporter, anchor and national correspondent. He worked at various radio and television jobs before joining CTV in 1990, CBS News in 1992 and CNN in 2007. On March 12, 2009, Roberts was inducted into the Canadian Broadcast Hall of Fame.

Early life

Roberts was born in Toronto, Ontario and grew up in Mississauga, Ontario. He attended Erindale Secondary School and later the University of Toronto at Mississauga.^{[citation needed]}

Career

Local radio

Roberts first started working in radio at the local college station, CFRE-FM in Mississauga. He briefly worked on-air for radio station CJBK in London, Ontario in 1977, before moving back to Toronto to join top-40 powerhouse CHUM later that year as a weekday evening disc jockey. Roberts also worked briefly with CFOS in Owen Sound, Ontario in the 1980s.

CITY-TV and MuchMusic

In 1979, he branched out from his music personality work to function as an entertainment reporter and co-host with Jeanne Beker of the music newsmagazine The NewMusic on CITY-TV until 1985. He was known as J.D. Roberts when he was a video jockey as fill-in host of CITY-TV's local music video show Toronto Rocks, and later MuchMusic, a music video channel. He and Christopher Ward appeared as the first on-air personalities when the network launched in 1984. At MuchMusic he hosted a one hour heavy metal video show called The Power Hour.

He also served as an entertainment reporter and anchor on CITY-TV's CityPulse, and became anchor of the 22:00 CityPulse Tonight in 1987 when Anne Mroczkowski moved from anchoring that newscast to join Gord Martineau on the 18:00 edition.

WCIX

Between 1989 and 1990 Roberts was an anchor/reporter for WCIX (now WFOR-TV), the CBS-owned and operated television station in Miami, Florida.

CTV

Roberts returned to Canada in September 1990 to co-host the national CTV morning show Canada AM, initially with Deborah McGregor, and later with Pamela Wallin.

CBS

Roberts anchored the 17:00 and 23:00 newscasts at CBS's flagship station in New York, WCBS-TV.^{[citation needed]}

Roberts served as Chief White House Correspondent at CBS from 1999 to 2006, and regularly anchored a Sunday-afternoon 15:00 ET newscast for the CBS Radio Network. He had been widely considered a potential replacement for CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather after Rather stepped down from the anchor desk in March 2005, but Bob Schieffer was chosen on an interim basis to be the next CBS Evening News anchor, and in subsequent months, it became clear that Roberts was not under consideration for the job.^{[citation needed]}

In March 2003, Roberts was embedded with the 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion of the U.S. Marines during the initial invasion of Iraq.

On July 19, 2005 he introduced CBS's coverage on the announcement of the nomination of John G. Roberts, Jr. for the Supreme Court of the United States. He once joked in a newspaper column that he asked to be referred to as "Your Honor" because he and Justice Roberts bear the same name.^{[citation needed]}

CNN

In February 2006, Roberts left CBS and joined CNN. In July 2006 and August 2006, Roberts reported from the front lines in the Israel/Hezbollah war and at one point, embedded with an Israeli infantry unit, marching 10 miles into Lebanon.^{[citation needed]} CNN's coverage of the war was recognized with an Edward R. Murrow Award.

Roberts was a co-anchor of CNN's morning program American Morning from 2007 to 2010. He anchored from New York. In October 2006, he returned to Iraq as the first anchor of This Week at War and served as the Senior National Correspondent based in Washington. He has also substituted for Anderson Cooper on Anderson Cooper 360.

The New York Post reported on December 7, 2010, that Roberts would depart American Morning and become a national correspondent based out of CNN's headquarters in Atlanta. The Associated Press reported that Roberts' departure was at his request so he could move closer to fiancée and CNN anchor Kyra Phillips.

Fox News

Executives at CNN confirmed on January 3, 2011 that Roberts would be leaving CNN to join Fox News as a national correspondent, based in Atlanta.

Personal life

Divorced since 2008, John Roberts announced his engagement to CNN anchor Kyra Phillips on April 25, 2010 Their twin children Sage Ann and Kellan Clay were born March 15, 2011.

External links

• What's In A Name? – Commentary by John D. Roberts on the Supreme Court nomination of John Roberts, and his opinion on the name.
• John Roberts, anchor, CNN's American Morning, inducted Broadcast Industry Hall of Fame during the Canadian Music Industry Awards Canadian Music Week, March 11–14, 2009