Andrea Mitchell

Early life

Mitchell was raised in a Jewish family from New Rochelle, New York, the daughter of Sydney Mitchell, a businessman, and his wife, Cecile Mitchell. Her family's original surname was Metchik. The family is of Russian-Jewish descent.

Her father was the chief executive officer and partial owner of a furniture manufacturing company in Manhattan. He was also the president of Beth El Synagogue in New Rochelle for 40 years. Her mother was an administrator at the New York Institute of Technology in Manhattan. Her brother Arthur and his wife, Nancy Mitchell, moved to British Columbia in the 1970s. He has dual American and Canadian citizenship, becoming a member of the Legislative Assembly of Yukon and the leader of the Yukon Liberal Party in the 2000s.

Mitchell is a graduate of New Rochelle High School. She went on to attend the University of Pennsylvania, where she received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature in 1967. While at Penn, she served as news director of student radio station WXPN.

Career

Staying in Philadelphia after graduation, Mitchell was hired as a reporter at KYW radio. She rose to prominence as the station's City Hall correspondent during Mayor Frank Rizzo's administration, and also reported for sister station KYW-TV. In 1976, Mitchell moved to CBS affiliate WTOP (now WUSA) in Washington, D.C.

NBC News and MSNBC

In July 1978, Mitchell moved to NBC's network news operation, serving as a general correspondent. In 1979, she was named NBC's energy correspondent, reporting on the late-1970s energy crisis and the Three Mile Island nuclear accident. Mitchell covered the White House from 1981 through 1988, when she became NBC's chief Congressional correspondent. In 1984 she and Linda Ellerbee coanchored Summer Sunday USA, the first prime-time television news series coanchored by two women. In 1992, she was named NBC's chief White House correspondent, holding that position until November 1994. Mitchell has served as the network's chief foreign affairs correspondent since 1994.

From 2008 to 2025, Mitchell hosted Andrea Mitchell Reports on MSNBC. She stepped down from that position on February 7, 2025, but will remain NBC News's chief Washington correspondent and chief foreign affairs correspondent.

In 2005, Mitchell's memoir, Talking Back... to Presidents, Dictators, and Assorted Scoundrels, (ISBN 978-0-143-03873-3), was published. It chronicles her work as a journalist.

Controversies

A report in The Washington Post ("Bush Administration Is Focus of Inquiry CIA Agent's Identity Was Leaked to Media" by Mike Allen and Dana Priest, The Washington Post, September 28, 2003) that Mitchell had leaked Valerie Plame's identity led to her being questioned by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

In October 2003, on the Capitol, Mitchell said, "It was widely known amongst those of us who cover the intelligence community and who were actively engaged in trying to track down who among the foreign service community was the envoy to Niger. But, frankly, I wasn't aware of [Plame's] actual role at the CIA, and the fact that she had a covert role involving weapons of mass destruction, not until Bob Novak wrote it."

During a July 2005 news conference in Khartoum, Mitchell was forcibly ejected from a room after asking Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir some pointed questions. They included: "Can you tell us why the violence is continuing?" (referring to genocide in Sudan's Darfur province) and "Can you tell us why the government is supporting the militias (Janjaweed)?" "Why should Americans believe your promises?"

After the incident, Mitchell said, "It is our job to ask. They can always say 'no comment' ... but to drag a reporter out just for asking is inexcusable behavior."

Before the incident, Sudanese officials had expressed reservations about allowing American newspaper or television reporters to join the Sudanese press pool. Sean McCormack, the State Department's assistant secretary for public affairs, said to his Sudanese counterpart, "I'll convey your desires about not permitting reporters to ask questions, but that's all I'll do. We have a free press." McCormack's Sudanese counterpart replied, "There is no freedom of the press here."

During an appearance on MSNBC on June 5, 2008, Mitchell referred to the voters of the southwest Virginia region as rednecks. On June 9, she apologized on air, saying "I owe an apology to the good people of Bristol, Virginia, for something stupid that I said last week. I was trying to explain, based on reporting from Democratic strategists, why Barack Obama was campaigning in southwest Virginia, but without attribution or explanation, I used a term strategists often use to demean an entire community. No excuses, I'm really sorry."

Personal life

She married her second husband, then Federal Reserve Chair Alan Greenspan, on April 6, 1997, following a lengthy relationship. Previously, she was married to Gil Jackson; that marriage ended in divorce in the mid-1970s.

On September 7, 2011, Mitchell revealed that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer during a doctor's visit a few weeks earlier. It was caught early and treated.

In 2017, Mitchell and Greenspan endowed the University of Pennsylvania with the "Andrea Mitchell Center for the Study of Democracy".

Greenspan died on June 22, 2026, due to complications from Parkinson's disease. He was 100 years old.