Succession Drama Sweeps D.C.

Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Bernie Sanders
Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty Images
Tara Palmeri
May 12, 2022

Spring is in the air, at last, and that rebirth is manifesting itself in this town via a number of high-profile succession storylines. First, Judy Woodruff, Washington’s grand dame of political news, is set to step down from the anchor desk of PBS’s NewsHour after the midterm elections, after carefully picking her successors, Amna Nawaz and Geoff Bennett. Woodruff, 75, has been a member of the Washington press corp since 1976 and a member of its ruling class more or less ever since. She was an O.G. PBS anchor, who co-hosted CNN’s Inside Politics with Bernard Shaw before boomeranging back to PBS full-time. She sits on the board of the Gridiron Club, where she was bouncing around during the super-spreader event this spring. Along with her husband, fellow beltway creature Al Hunt, she has become an icon of the exalted political journalist class.