NBC News vice president and Washington bureau chief Ken Strickland announced new reporting assignments and beats in D.C., highlighted by two longtime political reporters who will become NBC News White House correspondents: Mike Memoli and Carol Lee.
As we’ve noted in the past, Memoli is very familiar with President Biden, having covered him going back to his 2008 run for president. In fact, inside the NBC News D.C. bureau, Memoli is affectionately referred to as “The Biden whisperer.”
Lee joined NBC News in 2017 after having covered the White House for the Wall Street Journal. We featured Lee in July 2020 as part of our TVNewser Notebook series, and when we asked Memoli last year which political reporter’s work he truly admires, the first name that came to mind was Lee’s.
Elsewhere, Leigh Ann Caldwell and Garrett Haake are taking on the roles of NBC News Capitol Hill correspondents, joining Kasie Hunt covering Congress.
Josh Lederman has been named NBC News correspondent reporting on climate policy across the Biden Administration.
Heidi Przybyla, an NBC News correspondent, will focus her reporting on the federal response to the coronavirus and vaccine roll out.
Ali Vitali, after returning from the 2020 campaign trail, is taking on the role of NBC News political correspondent.
Vaughn Hillyard will serve as a NBC News political reporter continuing to cover politics all across the country.
Marianna Sotomayor, most recently a political embed for NBC News covering the 2020 presidential campaign, is now a Capitol Hill reporter.
Finally, Deepa Shivaram, who covered then-Senator Kamala Harris as an embed, will continue to report on the Vice President as well as Biden Administration efforts pertaining to race and equity.