Chris Wallace, anchor for Fox News Sunday, moderated the much-anticipated first presidential
debate between President Donald Trump and Joe Biden on September 29th, 2020.
The appointment put Wallace in the spotlight in a big way, but he's certainly no stranger
to taking the stage during national events.
"You may know me from your parents' TV when you go home to do laundry."
Wallace moderated the third presidential debate in 2016 between Trump and Hillary Clinton.
And following Wallace's performance, The Washington Post noted,
"No one could watch the final debate and deny that Chris Wallace is among the best in the
business."
Wallace also conducted an interview in 2018 with Russian president Vladimir Putin and
shortly after, Wallace covered Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court case, in which he was accused
of assault by Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, and others.
But while Wallace works for Fox News, the anchor's political affiliations might come
as a surprise.
Wallace grew up in a Jewish family in Chicago, and his father, Mike Wallace, was a prominent
journalist and innovative news anchor for 60 Minutes.
"There is a new billionaire in town, Trump's the name.
[…] I don't think it's journalism, I think it's show business."
Mike Wallace married Norma Kaphan in 1940 and they had two sons.
Chris's brother Peter died in 1962.
"Can you imagine having Mike Wallace as a father?"
"You go out on a date, and you come home, and Mike Wallace is sitting there waiting
to ask you questions."
When his parents split after 8 years of marriage, Wallace's mother married Bill Leonard, then-president
of CBS News, according to HuffPost.
It was Leonard who got Wallace interested in reporting.
Wallace remembered of his childhood,
"If the car hit a milestone, say 20,000 miles, we would do a special report.
[Bill] would be the anchor, and I would be on the assembly line in Detroit with the guy
who had made the car.
And then I'd be the White House correspondent talking about what this meant for the balance-of-trade
deficit because this was a terrific General Motors car."
Wallace attended Harvard University and was actively involved in the 1969 protest, where
students occupied University Hall in response to the Vietnam War and Harvard's ROTC program.
Wallace recalled to Harvard Magazine how he was hauled off to jail and used his one phone
call to give a report to a local radio station.
Once Wallace completed his education, he began working at NBC in New York City, as the network's
White House correspondent.
In 1989, he joined ABC News.
And 14 years later, he jumped networks and became the Fox News Sunday host — a position
which Wallace admitted he was wary about, especially since he's a registered Democrat.
He told the Chicago Tribune,
"I had the same conception a lot of people did about Fox News, that they have a right-wing
agenda.
I'm a straight-news man — I plead guilty."
Wallace admitted he votes for the candidate rather than the party, and as a journalist,
he remains impartial.
He explained,
"Do I have political opinions?
Absolutely.
But I vote for the person, and I've voted for Republicans and Democrats and independents
over the course of my life.
I feel very strongly that you try not to let that affect the way you report the news."
Wallace is known for being tough but fair in his interviews, and he's even made history
for his network on numerous occasions.
In 2009, he became the first Fox host to interview President Barack Obama.
Then in 2016, he moderated the presidential debate, he became the first-ever Fox network
host to do so.
In 2018, Wallace earned a News and Documentary Emmy Award for Outstanding Live Interview
after meeting with Vladimir Putin, which, Forbes reported, was, quote, "the first Emmy
nomination in Fox News' history."
But despite his professional success, sometimes events hit much closer to home.
In September 2018, as Wallace covered Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court hearing, Wallace's
own daughters shared with him instances that had happened to them in high school, after
they heard Dr. Blasey Ford's testimony.
At the time, Wallace said on Fox News,
"There are teenage girls who don't tell stories to a lot of people, and then it comes up,
and I don't think we can disregard that.
I don't think we can disregard Christine Blasey Ford and the seriousness of this.
I think that would be a big mistake."
"This was extremely emotional, extremely raw, and extremely credible."
When it comes to distilling the real news, Wallace is clearly the man for the job.
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