Bob Woodward

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Lore & Background

Woodward was teamed up with Carl Bernstein to cover a break-in at the Watergate office complex on a Saturday in June 1972. Five burglars had been caught red-handed; four of them turned out to be ex-CIA agents who did security work for the Republicans. In the series of stories that followed, Woodward and Bernstein eventually connected the burglars to a massive slush fund and a corrupt attorney general. Bernstein was the first to suspect that President Nixon was involved, and he found a laundered $25,000 check that linked Nixon to the burglary. Their discoveries led to further investigations of Nixon, and on August 9, 1974, Nixon resigned to avoid facing impeachment. In 1974, two years after the Watergate burglary and two months before Nixon resigned, Woodward and Bernstein released the book All the President's Men. The book drew upon the notes and research accumulated while writing articles about the scandal for the Post and "remained on best-seller lists for six months". In 1975, it was turned into a movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Bernstein and Robert Redford as Woodward which later went on to be nominated in multiple Oscar (including Best Picture nomination), Golden Globe and BAFTA categories. A second book, The Final Days, was published by Woodward and Bernstein in 1976 as a follow-up chronicling Nixon's last days in office. Woodward and Bernstein had very different personalities. Raised in a traditional Republican household, Woodward was very well-educated and has been described as gentle. After graduating from Yale University, he joined The Washington Post; nine months later, he was assigned the Watergate break-in story. Woodward's strength was in investigation, so he focused on investigating the Watergate scandal. He met his Deep Throat source secretly to get as much information as possible. His writing was serious and matter-of-fact. Other journalists described them as a perfect team. Alicia Shepard said, "Carl was the big thinker, and Woodward was the one that [made] sure it got done ... [T]hey knew that each of them had strengths that the other didn't, and they relied on one another."

Reader's Guide

Bob Woodward's significance lies in his role as a central figure in modern investigative journalism. His Watergate reporting with Carl Bernstein set a standard for accountability journalism, leading to the resignation of a U.S. president. The work of Woodward and Bernstein was called "maybe the single greatest reporting effort of all time" by long-time journalism figure Gene Roberts. Their book All the President's Men remained on best-seller lists for six months and was adapted into a 1976 film nominated for multiple Oscars, Golden Globes, and BAFTAs. Woodward's secret informant, known as Deep Throat, was a key element of their reporting, though the source does not reveal his identity. Woodward's strength was in investigation, while Bernstein was the strong writer; together they formed a perfect team according to other journalists.

Did You Know?

• Woodward was teamed up with Carl Bernstein to cover the Watergate break-in on a Saturday in June 1972.
• The work of Woodward and Bernstein was called 'maybe the single greatest reporting effort of all time' by Gene Roberts.
• Woodward and Bernstein's book All the President's Men remained on best-seller lists for six months.
• Woodward was raised in a traditional Republican household and graduated from Yale University.
• Alicia Shepard described Woodward as 'the one that [made] sure it got done' in the Watergate reporting team.

Roots in a Political Capital

Carl Milton Bernstein was born on February 14, 1944, in Washington, D.C., to a secular Jewish family steeped in activism. His parents, Sylvia and Alfred Bernstein, were civil-rights advocates and, in the 1940s, members of the Communist Party USA. Growing up in the nation's capital, he absorbed a deep suspicion of institutional power that would define his career. At Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland, he managed circulation for the student paper, the Silver Chips, and by sixteen he was already a copyboy at The Washington Star, advancing through its ranks with remarkable speed. The Star's unofficial college-degree requirement eventually sent him to the University of Maryland, where he reported for The Diamondback before being dismissed after the fall 1964 semester for poor grades. A year at the Elizabeth Daily Journal in New Jersey in 1965 sharpened his craft; he won first prize in the state press association for investigative reporting, feature writing, and deadline news. In 1966 he joined The Washington Post, covering local beats and building a reputation as one of the paper's finest stylists.

The Watergate Breakthrough

On a Saturday in June 1972, Bernstein and Bob Woodward were dispatched to cover a break-in at the Watergate office complex, where the Democratic National Committee kept its headquarters. Five men had been caught in the act that morning; four of them were former CIA operatives who had done security work for the Republican Party. What began as a local crime story quickly became something far more dangerous. Bernstein and Woodward traced the burglars to a vast slush fund and a corrupt attorney general. Bernstein was the first to suspect that President Nixon himself was implicated, and he uncovered a laundered twenty-five-thousand-dollar check that tied the president to the burglary. Their reporting triggered a cascade of government investigations and, on August 9, 1974, Nixon resigned to avoid impeachment. The duo's 1974 book, All the President's Men, stayed on best-seller lists for six months, and the 1975 film adaptation earned Oscar, Golden Globe, and BAFTA nominations. Their 1976 follow-up, The Final Days, chronicled Nixon's last weeks in office.

Expanding the Lens: Broadcast, Foreign Affairs, and Biography

After leaving The Washington Post in 1977, Bernstein rode the wave of his Watergate fame into broadcast journalism. He served as a political commentator at ABC, CNN, and CBS, and even appeared in television commercials. One of his most ambitious post-Post projects was a year-long investigation into the secret cooperation between the CIA and American media during the Cold War, which he published as a twenty-five-thousand-word feature in Rolling Stone. At ABC News, where he held the Washington Bureau Chief position from 1980 to 1984, he broke a significant story during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon: Ariel Sharon had misled his own cabinet, concealing the true objective of driving Palestinians out of the country rather than merely establishing a security zone. His range extended into papal history with His Holiness (1996), co-written with Vatican expert Marco Politi, which argued that John Paul II's support for Solidarity in Poland and his geopolitical influence were central to communism's collapse in Europe. In 2007, Knopf published his Hillary Clinton biography, A Woman in Charge, with a first printing of 275,000 copies.

Personal Truths and a Lasting Mark on Journalism

Bernstein's career has consistently orbited the theme of power's use and abuse, but perhaps his most personal revelation came in 1989 with Loyalties: A Son's Memoir. In it, he disclosed that his parents had been members of the Communist Party of America—a fact that stunned observers, since even J. Edgar Hoover had tried and failed to prove their party affiliation. That same spirit of self-examination and institutional critique surfaced in 1992, when he penned "The Idiot Culture" for The New Republic, a sharp indictment of a modern press that had drifted toward sensationalism and gossip at the expense of substantive reporting. Long-time journalism figure Gene Roberts later described the Woodward-Bernstein Watergate effort as "maybe the single greatest reporting effort of all time," a testament that still anchors Bernstein's legacy. His 2022 memoir, Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom, returned to those early years in the newsroom, while his ongoing role as a CNN political commentator keeps him in the public conversation. Across six books as author or co-author, Bernstein has maintained an unbroken commitment to holding powerful institutions accountable.