Eva McKend is a Correspondent covering National Politics for CNN. She joined CNN’s Washington D.C. bureau in September 2021 as a National Politics Reporter. McKend previously served as an on-air Congressional Correspondent, reporting for Spectrum’s 24-hour news stations across the country from the nation’s capital.

She is known in Washington for her pointed questions to people in leadership, getting then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to confirm on the record that climate change is being exacerbated by humans and that he wasn’t going to be an “impartial juror” in President Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial. Her question to McConnell on reparations for slavery elicited his most robust rejection of the concept to date and drove the news cycle nationwide for several days.

Eva’s series of reports on Black hemp farmers following the crop’s legalization in the 2018 Farm Bill earned her a first-place prize in enterprise and investigative broadcast reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists in Louisville. She was also nominated for an Ohio Valley Regional Emmy for the work.

Eva is a regular guest on the WAMU/NPR program 1A, distributed to more than 400 public radio stations across the U.S. She also is regularly asked to join PBS’ Washington Week panel.

From 2015-18, she served as an anchor at WCAX-TV, the market-leading CBS affiliate in Vermont where she was also known for her strong interviews with elected officials. She was named a Rising Star by Vermont Business Magazine in 2017.

Before Vermont, Eva worked as a reporter for Spectrum News Hudson Valley from 2012-14. During her time in the region, she covered many stories as the Sullivan County reporter that received national and international attention including the murder trial of Paul Novak and the malfeasance of a village mayor, securing surveillance video from his high profile arrest via FOIA request, footage that went on to go viral. Her ongoing coverage of an illegal demolition in Monticello was recognized by the New York State Associated Press for Best Continuing Coverage. The AP also gave her a nod for General Excellence in Individual Reporting.

​Prior to this work, she spent a summer as a Washington, D.C.-based correspondent for Springfield, Mo., CBS affiliate KOLR/KOZL.

Eva is a graduate of Swarthmore College and earned her master’s degree in broadcast and digital journalism from the S.I. Newhouse School of Communications at Syracuse University through the Turner Diversity Fellowship. She is a proud member of the National Association of Black Journalists.