Connie Chung (宗毓華) born August 20, 1946 is an American journalist who has been an anchor and reporter for several U.S. television news networks.
Chung’s network television career has spanned NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, and MSNBC. Chung was a Washington, D.C.-based correspondent for the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite in the early 1970s, during the Watergate political scandal. Later, Chung left for the Los Angeles-owned and operated station of CBS, KNXT (now KCBS) which was in the nation’s second largest (and highest paying) local market, southern California. Chung also anchored the CBS Newsbriefs for the west coast stations from the KNXT studios at Columbia Square during her tenure there.
Chung’s interviews were largely gentle, but often they were punctuated by a rapid-fire barrage of sharp questions. Despite this, her interviews were still widely recognized as being decidedly softer than those of other interviewers, such as Barbara Walters or Mike Wallace. Consequently, her interviews were often used as a public relations move by those looking to overcome scandal or controversy. Some of her more famous interview subjects include Claus von Bülow and U.S. Representative Gary Condit, whom Chung interviewed first after the Chandra Levy disappearance. Chung was the first journalist to interview basketball legend Earvin “Magic” Johnson after he went public about being HIV-positive.