Dana Bash is CNN’s White House correspondent, responsible for covering the activities of the president and the administration, domestically and internationally. Named to this position in November 2002, she is based in the network’s Washington, D.C., bureau. Bash is also a frequent panelist on CNN’s Saturday Edition, one of the network’s public affairs programs.

Since 1999, Bash has covered every major story on Capitol Hill, including the Republican dominance in the 2002 elections, the war on terrorism, campaign finance reform, the Florida recount and the impeachment of former President Clinton. Frequently cited on-air by anchors and reporters, she also provided live reporting during the evacuation of the Capitol in the days after Sept. 11. Bash was one of the first journalists to report that Vermont’s Sen. Jim Jeffords would leave the Republican Party in May 2001, giving control of the U.S. Senate to Democrats. In 2002, she broke the story of the government’s secret intercepts of Al Qaeda translations on Sept. 10, 2001, for which she is receiving tonight’s Dirksen Award.

In 2000 she covered the presidential primaries, including those in Iowa and New Hampshire, traveling extensively with former Vice President Gore, Sen. Bill Bradley and other presidential candidates. She also helped coordinate coverage for both the Republican and Democratic vice presidential selections. Bash wrote a weekly column for Roll Call Daily, Capitol Hill’s daily news and opinion digest from the editors and writers of Roll Call. She graduated cum laude with her bachelor’s of arts degree in political communications from George Washington University.

Bash won the 2019 Sol Taishoff Award for Excellence in Broadcast Journalism. She won the Dirksen Award for Distinguished Coverage of Congress in 2002, 2010 and 2012.

2002 Everett McKinley Dirksen Award for Distinguished Reporting of Congress
Dana Bash / CNN