Carl Bernstein (pronounced
/ˈbɜrnstiːn/ BURN-steen) (born February 14, 1944) is an
American journalist who, as a reporter for
The Washington Post along with
Bob Woodward, broke the story of the
Watergate break-in and consequently helped bring about the resignation of
United States President Richard Nixon. For his role in breaking the scandal, Bernstein received many awards; his work helped earn the
Post a
Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 1973.
In a 1977 Rolling Stone article, Bernstein revealed that over 400 US journalists had been employed by the CIA, secretly carrying out assignments and publishing news stories for them.[1]
In his 1989 memoir Loyalties, Bernstein revealed that his parents had been members of the Communist Party, which shocked some because even J. Edgar Hoover had tried and been unable to prove that Bernstein's parents were party members.[2] Bernstein's parents were allegedly persecuted during the 1950s. The FBI conducted surveillance on his family over a 30 year period producing over 2,500 pages of documents, including notes taken by agents staking out his bar mitzvah.[3]
Bernstein graduated from Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland. He subsequently attended the University of Maryland, College Park. Bernstein, who is Jewish, is a lifetime member of B'nai B'rith and once was President of B'nai B'rith's Northern Region.
