Nedra Pickler

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Nedra Pickler (b. October 13, 1975) is a U.S. political reporter for the Associated Press (AP). She has worked there since 2000 and has covered the United States presidential election in 2004 and 2008.

1 Background
2 Career
3 Personal life
4 Notes

[edit] Background

Pickler was born in Flint, Michigan, but her family moved to Rector, Arkansas to run a catfish farm shortly after she was born. After her parents separated in 1983, she moved back north to Flint with her mother Marcy and sister Anna. ^[1] She describes growing up in poverty, with her mother going to Mott Community College when she couldn't find a job.^[2]

Pickler attended Michigan State University, graduating in 1998 at the top of her journalism class.^[3] She interned with the Detroit Free Press and Houston Chronicle as a college student.^[4]

[edit] Career

Pickler was hired by the Detroit offices of AP shortly after graduation. In March 2000, she transferred from the Lansing bureau to the Washington, D.C. bureau where she won the annual John L. Dougherty award for her work covering Michigan's congressional delegation. ^[5]

Pickler was promoted to cover national political issues for the AP in December 2002, and was the lead reporter covering Democrats in the 2004 United States Presidential Election. In her coverage of the 2004 presidential race, Pickler drew criticism for her treatment of Democratic candidates, including Howard Dean ^[6] and John Kerry. ^[7]

Pickler worked as a White House correspondent until September 2006, leaving to cover national politics, including the 2008 United States Presidential Election. ^[8]

In covering the 2008 election, Pickler again came under scrutiny for her coverage of the Democratic candidates, particularly Barack Obama. A March 27, 2007 article written by Pickler entitled "Is Obama All Style and Little Substance?" was criticized for its false claim that Obama had "delivered no policy speeches and provided few details about how he would lead the country" in his campaign up to that point.^[9] The progressive media watchdog group Media Matters for America countered by pointing out that Obama had given numerous policy speeches on Iraq^[10], Israel^[11], health care^[12], and other topics.^[13] In February 2008, Pickler again came under criticism after she wrote an article in which she detailed Republican charges that questioned Obama's patriotism. Her main source was Roger Stone, a Republican consultant already notorious in the 2008 election for founding a non-profit organization named CUNT (Citizens United Not Timid) in order to "educate the American people about what Hillary Clinton really is."^[14]. The article drew approximately 15,000 letters of complaint^[15] directed to the AP and media outlets carrying Pickler's article in a matter of days.

Her reporting was largely responsible for feeding the controversy surrounding Obama advisor Austan Goolsbee's meeting with the Canadian consulate ^[16], as she broke the story on a memo suggesting that Goolsbee had reassured the Canadian government that Barack Obama's stance on NAFTA was "more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans".

On 18 April 2008, she produced a story on the Democratic candidates in which the first sentence was: "Democratic presidential rivals Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama are complaining about which candidate is the biggest complainer."^[17]

On June 1, 2008, she produced a story on the Democratic convention in which the first sentence was: "The fate of nearly 2.3 million Democratic presidential primary votes belongs to 30 party activists." ^[18]. The Democratic Convention Rules & Bylaws Committee is made up of members of the National Democratic Committee.

[edit] Personal life

In 2000, she suffered from identity theft, and was interviewed by CNN. ^[19]

Pickler married Eric Conner, who works for Fox News, on November 24, 2007. ^[20] She first met him in 2006 while on a trip to Mexico covering President George W. Bush.^[2]