Heather Nauert is an American journalist and current acting Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs and Spokesperson for the United States Department of State.

Early years and education

Heather Nauert is a former American news anchor and was born on January 27, 1970 in Rockford, Illinois. Her father was an insurance executive and her mother was a horse trader from Denver, Colorado.  She considers her parents to be the greatest influencers in her life; her father taught her the importance of hard work and sticking to a project and her mother taught her to believe in herself. Nauert grew up in Wisconsin and attended Pine Manor College in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, graduated with B.A. in Arts and Communications from Mount Vernon College for Women in Washington D.C. and received a Masters degree in Journalism from Columbia University. She is a fellow member for the Council of Foreign Relations. Nauert has said that in her freshman year in college she took a journalism class in college and she loved it, her first article was about a dorm fire and her second was about a presidential trip to South America. She was truly hooked!

Career

Nauert’s television reporting career began in the late 1990’s. Her first job was in 1996 as a reporter for the syndicated business news program First Business. She also worked as a government affairs consultant on tax, health insurance and issues related to Social Security in Washington D.C. Nauert contributed to Fox News Channel for three years as a correspondent working for The Big Story with John Gibson and Heather Nauert, and Good Day New York for FOX5 WYNT-TV. She remained with Fox News until 2005 when she subsequently moved to ABC News where she served for two years as a general assignment correspondent for Good Morning America, World News Tonight and Nightline. She returned to Fox News Channel in 2007 as a news anchor. 

Nauert served as a news anchor for Fox News Channel on Fox & Friends and as the co-host of Fox & Friends First. She provided the top headlines of the day on weekdays for the 6-9 AM slot for Fox & Friends. In 2009, she was the co-host, along with Steve Lucy, for the newscast Good Day Early Call and Good Day New York Wake Up. In October 2012, she left Good Day Wake Up and joined The Strategy Room on Fox News.com. Her work included covering major breaking stories such as the aftermath of September 11 terrorist attack and the Iraqi election. She also reported from the Republican and Democratic conventions, presidential debates and the inauguration.

During her stint with ABC, she received an Emmy nomination for her outstanding work on the special series 13 Around the World. She also received a nomination for the News and Documentary Emmy Award for Outstanding Continuing Coverage of a News Story in a Regularly Scheduled Newscast in 2007, while she was in FNC. Heather has said that she'll never forget interviewing the people whose relatives died on 9/11. Two days after the attacks, a Family Center was established in New York City to serve as a clearinghouse for information about missing relatives.  Heather was sent there to give hourly news updates and she said that when she arrived, families desperate for information approached her, hoping she might know where their husband or wife was. She said that she still remembers looking into their eyes; they were filled with so much sadness and desperation. She recounts that it was heartbreaking to talk with them because many believed that their family member was still alive somewhere. She said that, to this day, she looks at those interviews and cries when because she remembers the overwhelming sadness.