PERSON: Geraldo Rivera

Fox News Channel

Host

Geraldo Rivera is currently host of “Geraldo at Large” on Fox News Channel (FNC), which is also nationally syndicated by Twentieth Television. Rivera recently celebrated 40 years in journalism.<br> <br> Most recently, Rivera secured an exclusive interview with Joe Jackson, just after the death of his son Michael Jackson. Prior to that, he secured an exclusive interview with the late Michael Jackson on the evening before his trial for child molestations charges. Rivera also took part in extensive coverage of the Minneapolis bridge collapse and the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina<br> <br> Rivera joined FNC as a war correspondent in November 2001. In this capacity, he was immediately stationed in Afghanistan to cover Operation Enduring Freedom and later in Bethlehem to cover the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He also covered the Iraqi elections from Baghdad.<br> <br> Rivera began his career as a reporter for WABC-TV in New York where he presented a series exposing the deplorable conditions at the Willowbrook State School for the mentally ill. These award-winning reports led to a government investigation and the institution was eventually shut down.<br> <br> Before becoming a member of the original cast of ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Rivera presented the first television broadcast of the infamous Abraham Zapruder film of the assassination of President John Kennedy as host of ABC’s “Good Night America.” He then began an eight-year association with ABC’s “20/20” as an investigative reporter. One of his hour-long reports, “The Elvis Cover-Up” was for more than two decades “20/20’s” highest rated shows. In 1987, Geraldo began producing and hosting “The Geraldo Rivera Show” for 11 years. In 1998, he hosted a series of investigative specials on NBC.<br> <br> The winner of the 2000 Robert F. Kennedy journalism award (his third) for his NBC News documentary on “Women In Prison,” and the Scripps Howard Foundation national journalism award for “Back to Bedlam,” Rivera has received more than 170 awards for journalism, including the prestigious George Foster Peabody Award, three national and seven local Emmys, two Columbia-Dupont and two additional Scripps Howard Journalism Awards.<br> <br> Rivera is a veteran foreign correspondent who has been on the frontlines in virtually every international conflict since 1973. He has expertise in the Afghanistan region, covering the international drug wars of tribal territories in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. His vast war experience has spanned the violent coup in Chile and the Yom Kippur War to the civil wars in Guatemala, the Philippines and Nicaragua as well as the ethnic conflicts in Lebanon (1980-83) and Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo (1998-1999). In 2000, he went to Colombia to cover the country’s civil war.<br> <br> Prior to joining Fox News, Rivera served as host of CNBC’s number-one rated prime time show, “Rivera Live,” where his critically-acclaimed coverage of the O.J. Simpson civil trial verdict set an all-time CNBC ratings record.<br> <br> Rivera is a graduate of the University of Arizona and Brooklyn Law School and is the author of seven books.<br> <br> — foxnews.com