Kyra Phillips

Kyra Phillips in an Investigative Correspondent for ABC News. She joined the network in April, 2018.

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Phillips created a school newspaper in the 4th grade, landing her first interview with Dr. Seuss. That was just the beginning. From covering war zones to the South Pole, and interviewing icons from U.S. presidents to Mother Teresa, Phillips’ journalistic journey has been nothing but awe-inspiring.

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An award-winning journalist, Phillips joined CNN in 1999 anchoring Live From, CNN Newsroom, American Morning, and moved to HLN in 2012 to anchor Raising America with Kyra Phillips, a daily interactive, investigative program that focused on news impacting the modern American family. She also led the network’s 2012 election coverage. 

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She has traveled the world to cover and investigate a wide range of breaking news, including four tours reporting in Iraq, first as an embedded journalist aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, then covering the war, and its effect on the Iraqi people. Her stories included the Baghdad School for the Blind, substance abuse within the Iraqi military, and an exclusive look inside Saddam Hussein's cell and his personal diary. Phillips' war coverage secured her the Atlanta Press Club's National Reporter of the Year for 2007.

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Her documentary about race relations and tensions in Jena, Louisiana, following the appearance of nooses at the town's high school, earned her the top documentary award from the Society of Professional Journalists. ​Throughout her career, Phillips has garnered exclusive interviews with some of the world's most public figures. Her most recent in-depth interview was with Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, about the rise of ISIS and Admiral Thad Allen, National Incident Commander for the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico, gaining unprecedented access to the disaster site. She secured Rev. Billy Graham's last television interview while producing a documentary on his last revival in New York. Phillips also produced special coverage and documentaries on the announcement of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin in Alaska, Hurricane Katrina, and sexual assault in prestigious U.S. military academies. She covered the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and CNN's 2012 Election coverage. One of Phillips' most recent CNN Investigations focused on sexual predators working in some of our most famous theme parks who were arrested in sex stings for crimes against children. She has extensive police S.W.A.T. training and has participated in specialized aviation training with the Navy's elite TOPGUN School.

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Just prior to the war in Iraq, Phillips became the first female journalist to fly in an F-14 air-to-air combat training mission over the Persian Gulf. She produced exclusive reports on the U.S. Navy's reconnaissance missions from the P-3 aircraft as well as the maritime interdiction operations from USS Paul Hamilton. For the first time ever, television audiences got a look inside the training of Naval Special Warfare, the Navy's Special Operations Command, the Navy SEALS, and Special Warfare Combatant Crewman's training.

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​In January 2002, Phillips spent a month in Antarctica, working on a documentary on the Earth's most frigid continent. Phillips traced the steps of famous explorer, Sir Ernest Shackleton. Building and sleeping in an igloo, rappelling down glaciers, and introducing viewers to rare penguin colonies and revealing some of the continent's most fascinating scientific discoveries.

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​In 2001, Phillips was the first network correspondent to gain exclusive access to CAG 9, the elite Navy air wing, in preparation for the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan. Her reports took viewers inside the cockpits of the world's most advanced strike fighter jets, and into training, as sailors and officers prepared to fight the war on terror overseas.

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​Prior to that, Phillips served as an investigative reporter and anchor for KCBS-TV in Los Angeles. She was a weekend anchor and reporter for WDSU-TV in New Orleans and prior to that, anchored and reported for WLUK-TV in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Phillips has also served as morning anchor and reporter for KAMC-TV in Lubbock, Texas, and as a field producer for CNN-Telemundo in Washington, D.C.

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Phillips has won two Peabody awards, six Emmy awards, and two Edward R. Murrow awards for investigative reporting. Additionally, she has won numerous Golden Microphones and other honors. Phillips' investigation into how a convicted murderer could purchase personal information about children triggered national legislation and earned her the Bill Stout Memorial Award for enterprise reporting.

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​Since 1992, Phillips has been a Big Sister with national Big Brothers Big Sisters of America mentoring program. She participates on the board of the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation, The Fisher House Foundation, and serves on the Honorary Board for the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors. She received the National Global Down Syndrome Foundation's Quincy Jones Exceptional Advocacy Award in 2013 and is now a Global Ambassador. Phillips is also the co-author of The Whole Life Fertility Plan published in 2015, a contributing writer on Chicken Soup for the Soul: Billy Graham & Me, and is a 2017 Forty Over 40 honoree. 

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​Phillips earned a bachelor's degree in Journalism from the University of Southern California. She is married to fellow journalist John Roberts, Chief White House Correspondent for FOX. They are proud parents of twins.