CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju to Host ‘Inside Politics’ on Sunday Mornings
- The Indian American will continue to cover Capitol Hill along with the new anchoring role.
CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju will be hosting the Sunday morning show “Inside Politics,” the network announced. The Indian American journalist replaces Abby Phillips, who has been promoted to host the 10 p.m. primetime slot. Raju will continue to cover Capitol Hill, along with the Sunday show, “building on his decades of experience reporting from around Washington to provide CNN’s audience with the most accurate breaking news and analysis around the top political stories sourced by the best reporters,” CNN said.
Announcing the changes, the network said “the new lineup showcases the breadth and depth of CNN’s journalism, with shows anchored by some of the network’s most celebrated journalists alongside new opportunities for some of CNN’s most enterprising next generation talent.”
A prominent presence on the cable network, Raju has been covering Capitol Hill, congressional races and the presidential campaigns for the past several years. Before joining CNN, he was a senior congressional reporter at Politico, and before that, he covered the Senate leadership for The Hill newspaper. He got his start in Washington as an associate editor and reporter at Inside Washington Publishers, where he covered federal environmental policy and later reported for Congressional Quarterly, writing about energy and environmental issues.
His journalism career began as a student reporter for the Badger Herald, also worked for the student radio station WSUM. He graduated from UW-Madison in 2002 with a bachelor’s degree in marketing. He was raised in suburban Chicago. In a 2018 blog on the university’s alumni association, Raju said the “University of Wisconsin is not just my alma mater, it’s part of my identity.” His Twitter profile describes him as “Wisconsin Badger for life.”
He has won multiple journalism awards for his reporting on the major battles consuming Washington and his coverage of campaign politics. In 2012, Raju was part of a team of four reporters who won the White House Correspondents Association’s prestigious Merriman Smith award for presidential reporting under deadline pressure for their coverage of the debt ceiling crisis. In 2015, Raju also was awarded first prize by the Society of Professional Journalists in D.C. for beat coverage of the 2014 midterm elections, and a Folio: Eddie Award for a feature profile on Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.).
He lives in Northwest D.C. with his wife, Archana Mehta and their twins.