George Stephanopoulos facts for kids

Quick facts for kids George Stephanopoulos
Stephanopoulos in 2024
Senior Advisor to the President
In office June 7, 1993 – December 10, 1996
President	Bill Clinton
Preceded by	Rahm Emanuel
Succeeded by	Sidney Blumenthal
White House Communications Director
In office January 20, 1993 – June 7, 1993
President	Bill Clinton
Preceded by	Margaret D. Tutwiler
Succeeded by	Mark Gearan
Personal details
Born	George Robert Stephanopoulos (1961-02-10) February 10, 1961 (age 63) Fall River, Massachusetts, U.S.
Political party	Democratic
Spouse	Ali Wentworth ​ (m. 2001)​
Children	2
Education	Columbia University (BA) Balliol College, Oxford (MA)

George Robert Stephanopoulos (born February 10, 1961) is an American television host, political commentator, and former Democratic advisor. Stephanopoulos currently is a coanchor with Robin Roberts and Michael Strahan on Good Morning America, and host of This Week, ABC's Sunday morning current events news program.

Before his career as a journalist, Stephanopoulos was an advisor to the Democratic Party. He rose to early prominence as a communications director for the 1992 presidential campaign of Bill Clinton and subsequently became White House communications director. He was later senior advisor for policy and strategy, before departing in December 1996.

Early life and education

George Stephanopoulos was born in Fall River, Massachusetts, the son of Robert George Stephanopoulos and Nickolitsa "Nikki" Gloria (née Chafos). His parents were of Greek descent. His father was a Greek Orthodox priest and dean emeritus of the Archdiocesan Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in New York City. His mother was the director of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America National News Service for many years.

Stephanopoulos speaking at Virginia Tech in March 2006

Following some time in Purchase, New York, Stephanopoulos moved to the eastern suburbs of Cleveland, Ohio, where he graduated in 1978 from Orange High School in Pepper Pike.

In 1982, Stephanopoulos received a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science summa cum laude from Columbia University in New York and was the salutatorian of his class. While at Columbia, he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa his junior year and was awarded a Harry S. Truman Scholarship. He was also a sports broadcaster for 89.9 WKCR-FM, the university's radio station. As a student, he lived in Carman Hall and East Campus.

Stephanopoulos attended Balliol College at the University of Oxford in England, as a Rhodes Scholar, earning a Master of Arts in Theology in 1984.

Political career

Early work

Stephanopoulos worked in Washington, D.C., as an aide to Democratic congressman Ed Feighan of Ohio. His job included drafting letters, memos, and speeches. His salary was reportedly $14,500 a year. He later became Feighan's chief of staff.

In 1988, Stephanopoulos worked on the Michael Dukakis U.S. presidential campaign. He noted that one of his attractions to the campaign was that Dukakis was a Greek-American liberal from Massachusetts. After the campaign, Stephanopoulos became an executive floor assistant to Dick Gephardt, U.S. House of Representatives Majority Leader; he held this position until he joined the Clinton campaign.

Clinton administration

Stephanopoulos and President Bill Clinton prepare for the State of the Union Address in 1994

Stephanopoulos was, with David Wilhelm and James Carville, a leading member of Clinton's 1992 U.S. presidential campaign. His role on the campaign is portrayed in the documentary film The War Room (1993). It was eventually nominated for the Best Documentary Feature Academy Award.

In the Clinton administration, Stephanopoulos served as a senior advisor for policy and strategy. His initiatives focused on crime legislation, affirmative action, and health care. His salary was reportedly $125,000 per year. At the outset of Clinton's presidency, Stephanopoulos also served as the de facto press secretary, briefing the press even though Dee Dee Myers was officially the White House Press Secretary. Stephanopoulos was regarded as a member of Bill Clinton's inner circle.

..... Both men suggested that Jones was just seeking cash for her story. Stephanopoulos also successfully sought to keep Jones' news conference off television. Stephanopoulos called NBC journalist Tim Russert, CNN chairman Tom Johnson, as well as several others, whom he convinced to keep her conference off television.

On February 25, 1994, Stephanopoulos and Harold Ickes had a conference call with Roger Altman to discuss the Resolution Trust Corporation's choice of Republican lawyer Jay Stephens to head the Madison Guaranty investigation as well as discussing if Stephens could be removed. The Madison Guaranty investigation would later turn into the Whitewater controversy.

In 1995, as he was pulling out of a parking space in front of a restaurant in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., he had a collision with a parked vehicle. Stephanopoulos was arrested and charged with leaving the scene of an accident and driving with an expired license and license plates. White House press secretary, Mike McCurry, said that President Clinton told Stephanopoulos "not to worry about" the accident but to get his license renewed. The charge of leaving the scene of an accident was subsequently dropped.

In 1999 Stephanopoulos and James Carville were sued for defamation by Gennifer Flowers. ..... He accused Flowers of doctoring her taped conversation with Clinton to make her story look creditable. ..... The suit was dismissed since his comments were not the basis for defamation.

Stephanopoulos resigned from the Clinton administration shortly after Clinton was re-elected in 1996. Stephanopoulos is credited as among the first inside the White House to recognize the damage the Lewinsky affair could cause to the Clinton presidency.

His memoir, All Too Human: A Political Education (1999), was published after he left the White House during Clinton's second term. It quickly became a number-one bestseller on The New York Times Best Seller list for five weeks. In the book, Stephanopoulos spoke of his depression and how his face broke out into hives due to the pressures of conveying the Clinton White House message. Clinton referred to the book in his autobiography, My Life, expressed regret for the excessive pressure he placed on the young staffer.

Stephanopoulos's book covers his time with Clinton from the day he met him in September 1991, to the day Stephanopoulos left the White House in December 1996, through two presidential campaigns and four years in the White House. Stephanopoulos describes Clinton in the book as a "complicated man responding to the pressures and pleasures of public life in ways I found both awesome and appalling".

Journalism

After leaving the White House at the end of Clinton's first term, Stephanopoulos became a political analyst for ABC News, and served as a correspondent on This Week, ABC's Sunday morning public affairs program; World News Tonight, the evening news broadcast; Good Morning America, the morning news program; along with other various special broadcasts.

Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton talk with George Stephanopoulos in December 2009 in Washington, D.C.

In September 2002, Stephanopoulos became host of This Week, and ABC News officially named him "Chief Washington Correspondent" in December 2005. The program's title added the new host's name.

When named to the position, Stephanopoulos was a relative newcomer to the show, usurping longtime panelists and short-term co-hosts Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts who, for a few years, briefly replaced the longtime original host, David Brinkley.

ABC News executives reportedly offered Ted Koppel, former Nightline anchor, the This Week host job in 2005 after the program's ratings had become a regular third-, fourth-, and sometimes fifth-place finish after competitors NBC, CBS, Fox, and syndicated programs. However, This Week beat Meet the Press on January 11, 2009, when Stephanopoulos interviewed president-elect Barack Obama.

On April 16, 2008, Stephanopoulos co-moderated, with Charles Gibson, the twenty-first, and ultimately final, Democratic Party presidential debate between Illinois Senator Barack Obama and New York Senator Hillary Clinton for the 2008 election cycle. While the debate received record ratings, the co-moderators were heavily criticized for focusing most of the first hour of the debate on controversies that occurred during the campaign rather than issues such as the economy and the Iraq War. Stephanopoulos acknowledged the legitimacy of the concerns over the order of the questions, but said they were issues in the campaign that had not been covered in previous debates.

During the 2008 presidential election campaign, Stephanopoulos launched a blog George's Bottom Line on the ABC News website. Stephanopoulos blogged about political news and analysis from Washington.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen is interviewed by Good Morning America's Stephanopoulos.

Stephanopoulos interviews President Joe Biden in 2021

In December 2009, ABC News president David Westin offered Stephanopoulos Diane Sawyer's job on Good Morning America after Sawyer was named anchor of World News. Stephanopoulos accepted the new position and began co-anchoring GMA on December 14, 2009. Stephanopoulos announced on January 10, 2010, that that would be his last broadcast as the permanent host of This Week. However, after his successor, Christiane Amanpour, left the show amid sagging ratings, it was announced that Stephanopoulos would return as host of This Week in December 2011. He signed a deal to stay with ABC until 2021 worth $105 million.

On January 7, 2012, Stephanopoulos was the co-moderator of a debate among Mitt Romney, Ron Paul and Rick Santorum. ..... During the debate, Romney said it was a preposterous question.

Following Diane Sawyer's departure from World News at the end of August 2014, Stephanopoulos was the Chief Anchor at ABC News from 2014 to 2020 while retaining his roles on GMA and This Week. Stephanopoulos leads a new documentary unit for Disney's digital platforms and hosts four primetime hour-long specials on the ABC network annually.

Speaking engagements

In 2009, Stephanopoulos spoke at the annual Tri-C Presidential Scholarship Luncheon held at the Renaissance Cleveland Hotel and praised Cuyahoga Community College.

Other ventures

George Stephanopoulos is the co-founder of production companies BedBy8 and George Stephanopoulos Productions. These companies produced Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields, Grand Knighthawk: Infiltrating the KKK, Power Trip: Those Who Seek Power and Those Who Chase Them, and Out of the Shadows: The Man Behind the Steele Dossier.

Personal life

Stephanopoulos is a Greek Orthodox Christian and has earned a master's degree in theology.

Stephanopoulos married Ali Wentworth, an actress, comedian, and writer, in 2001 at the Archdiocesan Cathedral of the Holy Trinity on New York's Upper East Side. They have two daughters, one born in 2002 and one born in 2005. Stephanopoulos was introduced to transcendental meditation by Jerry Seinfeld. Conducting an interview on Good Morning America, he said, "We're all here because we all have something in common—we all practice Transcendental Meditation. … I think that people don't really understand exactly what it is and what a difference it has made in people's lives."

Honors

In May 2007, Stephanopoulos received an Honorary Doctor of Laws from St. John's University in New York City.

He has won two, and been nominated for 17, News and Documentary Emmy Awards.

See also

In Spanish: George Stephanopoulos para niños