Mika Brzezinski on Liz Claman: ‘We Can All Do Ourselves a Favor and Take a Page Out of Liz’s Playbook in Staying Consistent and Going With Your Gut’

By A.J. Katz 

Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski wrote a piece about Fox Business anchor Liz Claman, which appears in her Know Your Value column on NBCNews.com.

Brzezinski writes that while most TV news viewers probably know Claman from her work at Fox Business, she got to know the TV newser in the late ‘90s when she was first starting out at CNBC.

“We have a similar career trajectory,” writes Brzezinski. “We both started at the bottom in local news. We were willing to work every shift, including overnights, to achieve our dreams. And as our careers blossomed, we did it all while being moms to young children.”

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Brzezinski recalls a difficult episode from when Claman was at CNBC having to do with her first child, an episode eerily similar to what Brzezinski experienced with her own child:

“When Liz first had Gabrielle, she was working the overnight shift at CNBC, anchoring from 5 a.m. to 7 a.m., in addition to the 11 a.m. show. One Saturday, when her husband was working and Liz was in that zombie-exhausted state that new moms are all too familiar with, Gabrielle toddled toward the stairs. Due to debilitating exhaustion, Liz’s reflexes were slower and she couldn’t grab Gabrielle in time.

To Liz’s horror, Gabrielle fell down the flight of stairs. The baby had a huge black eye and couldn’t get up or lift her head. They rushed to the hospital, and thankfully, Gabrielle was OK. But that feeling — of guilt, of trying to be all things to all people while forging ahead with your career — is something that never goes away. I experienced it myself when I fell down a very steep set of stairs with my baby daughter after an overnight shift, just six weeks after giving birth — which I wrote about in my book “All Things At Once.”

She also notes that Claman is the only female anchor on Fox Business during market hours, and the first broadcast journalist to land an hour-long, live sit-down interview with Warren Buffett. She was the first business news anchor to land an inside tour from Elon Musk inside his SpaceX California headquarters to see the original Falcon rocket and Dragon Capsule.

“When there was turmoil and change in our industry, Liz stayed true to what she is and who she is: an exceptional journalist,” writes Brzezinski. “She does great work every day, is steady and doesn’t waver. She also always goes with her gut instinct.”

She adds: “We can all do ourselves a favor and take a page out of Liz’s playbook in staying consistent and going with your gut. Even if a group of people around you are going in a direction you don’t believe is the right road to travel, go with what your gut tells you and take that ‘road less traveled.’ It worked for me. And it worked for Liz.”

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