On CBS’s Face the Nation, Connecticut-raised Margaret Brennan asks the tough questions

Feb. 25-- Feb. 25--The coveted interview of President Donald Trump on Super Bowl Sunday -- watched by about 100 million people this year -- went to Margaret Brennan, moderator of "Face the Nation."

The CBS anchorwoman and senior foreign affairs correspondent then showed a more jocular side Wednesday night with Stephen Colbert on "The Late Show."

Her next big assignment will be in Vietnam to cover the highly-anticipated summit between Trump and North Korea's enigmatic dictator Kim Jong Un.

But long before Brennan joined the enduring Sunday political talk show, she was brought up in Connecticut and attended Catholic schools in Danbury and Greenwich. The daughter of an art teacher and a life insurance company executive still has family here and refers to herself as a "CT Yankee" on her Twitter profile.

Brennan, 38, is marking one year in the anchor chair of "Face the Nation" and is the currently the only female host on the Sunday circuit. Last September, she gave birth to a son, three days after interviewing Vice President Mike Pence. She missed her 20th high school reunion at Sacred Heart in Greenwich, but did an event in D.C. for the all-girls Catholic school.

"Talking points aren't going to help the viewers understand something better," Brennan said. "They're about as useful as bumper sticker slogans. I try to also be very aware that my job is about bringing context, not debating the person I'm sitting across from."

The career trajectory of Brennan, a Fulbright-Hays scholar who graduated with honors from the University of Virginia and speaks Arabic, has been a rapid ascent.

It started with an internship at CNN in Atlanta before her final year of college, which eventually led to a producer job at CNBC for Wall Street maven Louis Rukeyser, who lived in Greenwich before his death in 2006. In 2009, Bloomberg Television hired Brennan.

"In some ways, Margaret not getting a full-time anchor job at CNBC was the best thing that happened to her," said Brian Shactman, a one-time CNBC colleague and former Connecticut resident. "If she had not decided to move on, she would not have forged her professional relationship with David Rhodes which brought her to Bloomberg and eventually one of the biggest jobs at CBS."

In 2012, Brennan joined CBS and was one of the first journalists to interview then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton after the Benghazi siege that claimed the lives of four Americans. In 2017, she was promoted to White House and senior foreign affairs correspondent by CBS, which made her the second woman after Lesley Stahl to host "Face the Nation" in 2018.

"It is always amazing how certain people judge talent," Shactman said. "I guess some at CNBC did not think she was anchor 'material,' but regardless, many of us there knew she had big-time talent -- brilliant, great language skills and stunning. Yet I am not even sure I could have guessed she'd be hosting 'Face the Nation' a decade later."

Brennan typically takes Mondays and sometimes Tuesday off before immersing herself in preparation for the hourlong show, which airs at 10:30 a.m. Sunday.

"It's the team here who kind of spitballs guests," Brennan said. "Who would be the best decision-maker/influencer to have on the program? Often, you have that weird Friday where you don't know what the lead is."

Or even a Saturday, for that matter -- like when the U.S. Senate narrowly confirmed Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court last October amid protests over the justice's alleged sexual misconduct as a teenager.

"This really is like a news cycle in hyperdrive," Brennan said. "You could be prepping for an interview that goes away. It's constantly staying on top of the news, constantly be reading."

It has been a whirlwind several months for Brennan. In September, she and her husband, Yado Yakub, a judge advocate in the Marine Corps, welcomed a baby boy. Then earlier this month, she landed a 45-minute sit-down with the president that aired on Super Bowl Sunday. Last year, Trump spurned an invitation from NBC to be interviewed for the Super Bowl.

"He was generous with his time, but I was trying to move us along, topic by topic," she said.

Brennan pressed Trump during an exchange over the partial government shutdown, pointing out to the president that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., offered $1 billion for border security.

"The only feedback I got was tough, but fair," said Brennan, who tries not to get caught up in the Twittersphere. "I think you have to have somewhat of a thick skin and an ability to stay focused in this business. You can't stop the incoming on Twitter."

The following Sunday, CBS aired an interview between Brennan and Adel Al-Jubeir, the Saudi minister of state for foreign affairs, who was asked about the war in Yemen and the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

"He knew Khashoggi for 30 years," said Brennan, who got her bachelor's degree in foreign affairs and Middle East studies, and studied Arabic in Jordan.

A number of the show's recent guests have been from Connecticut, including Congresswoman Jahana Hayes, who was part of a panel of freshmen House members who appeared Jan. 6, and New London's Democratic Mayor Michael Passero, who appeared via satellite on the Jan. 27 show to discuss the impact of the partial government shutdown on his city, home to the U.S. Coast Guard Academy.

"She really knows her trade," Passero said. "That's a great show. It's very formulaic. I thought the questions gave me the opportunity to make the points that I wanted to make."

Being the "face" of CBS has its perks for Brennan, who recounted to Colbert meeting U2 frontman Bono during a Washington, D.C., gathering of lawmakers for his humanitarian organization, ONE.

"Lindsey Graham -- Sen. Graham -- was on the program shortly thereafter and I was like, 'How cool was that event?' And he's like, 'I don't really like their music,' " Brennan told Colbert. "I was totally fan-girling while talking to Bono, by the way, who was very engaged, wanting to talk about Africa. He wanted to talk about the Syrian refugee crisis, the importance of U.S. aid continuing because of America's sort of leadership in the world and what that legacy is."

Neil Vigdor can be reached at [email protected].

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