Laura Ingraham has been a well-known personality at Fox News for many years. The 60-year-old is a bit of a controversial figure on television, but she has definitely made her mark in a highly competitive field.
So, what about her personal life? Here’s everything you should know about the talk show host.
Laura Ingraham was born on June 19, 1963 in Glastonbury, Connecticut. She grew up in a working-class family. Her father, James Frederick Ingraham III, served in World War II and owned a car wash. Her mother, Anne Caroline Kozak, worked at the local school and later as a waitress.
School Life of Laura Ingraham
Ingraham had three older brothers who were quite rough with her,” she says. Surprisingly enough, she wasn’t into politics during school; instead, she focused on sports.
In 1981, she graduated from Glastonbury High School and went to college. She attended Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, for her undergraduate studies. There she became the editor-in-chief of the well-known conservative Dartmouth Review. Laura was its first female editor and really knew how to shake things up.
“The Review took over my life,” Ingraham told the Hartford Courant in 1999.
“Here you had all these ’60s liberals — who used to be storming administration buildings themselves — running things at Dartmouth; they didn’t know how to handle this conservative independent paper. I got sued several times for libel by professors. We even ended up on ’60 Minutes’. It was an important moment for political involvement — it made doing ‘Crossfire’ seem easy.”
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While working with the paper, she sent an undercover reporter into an LGBTQ group at university to find out who was attending according to Business Insider.
Lawsuit at Dartmouth
She interviewed people like conservative commentator William Bennett and Pat Buchanan, among others. However, her time there also included some scandals. Ingraham faced backlash when the paper got sued by professor William Cole over libel after writing that his course was “the most outrageous,” calling him “a used Brillo pad.”
″Mr. Cole is black; he claims that our Review intentionally publishes articles … meant to defame blacks,” Magistrate Jerome Niedermeier said, adding that “The Review openly opposes many black students present at Dartmouth.”
Ingraham thought this lawsuit was ridiculous.
″I’m not sure who won but I feel I’ve made my point,” she stated. “It’s huge progress for investigative journalism within classrooms.”
After two years of legal battles, both sides signed an agreement ending their dispute without any money changing hands, despite Cole seeking $600k.
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Later on, Laura worked as a speechwriter alongside Gary Bauer for William Bennett.
Work as Speechwriter
After graduating college, she became a speechwriter during Reagan’s presidency and also worked under the Secretary of Transportation before going back to school, where she earned her Juris Doctor from the University of Virginia School Of Law.
She then clerked for Ralph Winter, a respected federal judge at the Second Circuit Court Of Appeals, located in New York City.
Next came work with Justice Clarence Thomas at the United States Supreme Court, along with the law firm Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom, where Bob Bennett (William’s brother) also worked.
“She’s unstoppable,” Bob Bennett said. “Very smart & full of energy! It seemed clear that practicing law wasn’t enough excitement for her. If she’d stuck with it she’d have done great, but politics were where her true passion lay.”
Her media career kicked off in the mid-90s when she launched her own show called Watch It! on MSNBC.
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By 2001, she started her radio program, The Laura Ingraham Show, which aired across more than 300 stations, including XM Satellite Radio, featuring discussions about various political issues recorded right from Washington, D.C.
She frequently guest-hosted The O’Reilly Factor on Fox News before eventually returning there herself.
Becoming A “Pundette”
For Laura, the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal marked a significant change since it opened doors allowing young conservative women like herself to gain recognition as political commentators known informally as “pundettes,” according to Los Angeles Times.
“She debates politics like lawyers debate cases, as if there can be no other view than her own, and what could possibly be wrong with her sadly out-of-touch opponent?” journalist Eric Alterman said.
In 2004, The Laura Ingraham Show joined Talk Radio Network and kept expanding. By 2012, it was ranked the No. 5 radio show in the US by Talkers Magazine.
Ingraham also appeared on the cover of The New York Times Magazine in 1995 for a piece about young conservatives.
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After that, Ingraham quickly became one of the most influential women in political and cultural commentary.
Laura Ingraham – Fox News
She wanted a larger platform for her show. In 2008, she got what she wished for: a three-week trial run for the TV show Just In on Fox News.
Ingraham announced in 2012 that she was leaving after almost ten years with Talk Radio Network. Her popular radio program, The Laura Ingraham Show, switched to Courtside Entertainment Group starting in January 2013.
At this time, she also created the conservative American website LifeZettle.
Then, in October of 2017, she started hosting a new Fox News Channel program, The Ingraham Angle. It became an immediate hit.
By July of 2018, The Ingraham Angle was rated as the third-highest cable news program among adults aged 25 to 54 across all cable news shows, according to Variety. It had an impressive viewership of about 2.6 million people!
Besides her work on TV and radio, she’s written several books too! Some are New York Times bestsellers like The Hillary Trap, Shut Up and Sing, Power to the People, and The Obama Diaries.
Laura Ingraham – Relationships
Laura has been involved with many relationships over time! The famous political commentator has dated several well-known men but she’s not currently married nor has ever been!
Being in the public eye means lots of gossip about her love life!
While at Dartmouth College, she met Dinesh D’Souza, who was an exchange student from India. Even though others teased him, they grew close. He taught her how to write news stories & track down sources. More importantly, he showed her how to stick with her beliefs.
They eventually became engaged but never made it down the aisle; however, their friendship continued.
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D’Souza was described as a “political expert, writer, documentary filmmaker, and once considered a genius among intellectuals” by Vanity Fair.
Dating History
In 2014, D’Souza faced charges for campaign finance fraud. Ingraham defended him by writing a letter to the court.
“Dinesh is simply one of the best people I have ever known,” wrote Laura.
“His kindness, spirit, philanthropy, compassion, and love for country are qualities I hope my kids will have when they grow up.”
During the 90s, when Laura’s TV career took off, more attention came towards her personal life too!
In 2008, The New Yorker reported that she briefly dated Keith Olbermann “a decade ago.” Their views were totally opposite politically, but Olbermann said that wasn’t why they broke up.
He mentioned: “There were some issues I saw would cause problems, but oddly enough, they weren’t political.”
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Over the next few years, their differences seemed more problematic!
Cold Relationship
Ingraham mentioned that Olbermann had disrespected American soldiers, stating:
“I think MSNBC really needs to get a medical team right now… I’m not sure what’s wrong with him, honestly. He wasn’t like this before.”
In 2017, Olbermann fired back at her, accusing her of “damaging her ex-boyfriend’s home by pushing the garden hose through the mail slot.”
Later on, Ingraham was said to have dated former politician and Democratic Senator Robert Torricelli in 1999 and economist Lawrence H. Summers, who was president of Harvard University in the early 2000s
