Lisa Desjardins


Lisa Desjardins is an American political journalist. She is a correspondent at the PBS NewsHour and has previously worked for the Associated Press and CNN Radio. As of 2018, she has reported on five U.S. presidential elections.

Early life and education

Desjardins was born in the state of Hawaii, but grew up in Annandale, Virginia. Her father was a Navy officer who retired at Captain, and later as a college teacher. She has three siblings and seven half-siblings on her father's side. She got interested in politics during her childhood.
Desjardins studied at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, between 1990 and 1994, earning a bachelor's degree in economics. Subsequently, she went to Russia for two years to study at Herzen University in Saint Petersburg, where she studied Russian studies and learned to speak Russian. Starting in 1996, she attended Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. She received a Master of Science degree in journalism from that university the following year.

Career

Desjardins' first job in journalism was at the local television station WBTW in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, between 1998 and 1999, when she was fired. Next, she worked as a freelance reporter for The Sun News, a Myrtle Beach newspaper, and, at the same time, as a freelance reporter for the news agency Reuters. After a few months, in October 1999, she left The Sun News and joined the Columbia NBC-affiliate WIS as a political reporter, while she remained a reporter for Reuters. At WIS, she covered the South Carolina Legislature, the debate on the display of the Confederate Flag at the South Carolina State House, and the 2000 Republican presidential primaries. In 2003, Desjardins became a newswoman at the Washington, D.C. bureau of the Associated Press, where she reported on, among other things, the 2004 presidential election; Medicaid; hurricanes; and the Iraq War.
After that, Desjardins joined CNN, where she would work for nine years between 2005 and 2014. She was CNN Radio's Congress correspondent, but she occasionally reported for CNN.com and CNN's news channel as well. When CNN Radio was shut down in June 2013, she was transferred to CNN's Washington Bureau, where she worked as a Capitol Hill reporter. She was part of the team that covered the 2008 presidential primaries. CNN received a Peabody Award in 2008 for their coverage. Besides, Desjardins reported on the 2010 Haiti earthquake for CNN Radio, whose coverage was awarded a Sigma Delta Chi Award. During her time at CNN, she wrote a personal finance book together with Rick Emerson called Zombie Economics: A Guide to Personal Finance. It was published in May 2011 by Avery Publishing. Desjardins chaired the June 2014 annual dinner of the Radio and Television Correspondents' Association. She left CNN after she was laid off in August 2014.
Desjardins joined the PBS NewsHour in October 2014 as a politics reporter. In July 2015, she was promoted to "political director". Desjardins appears on camera, and she writes articles for the website of the NewsHour.

Personal life

Desjardins has been married to Jason Desjardins since 2007. They have a son, who was born in 2016, and they live in Alexandria, Virginia.