Major Garrett

Major Garrett is an American journalist and the chief Washington correspondent for CBS News. He has covered Congress, the White House and presidential campaigns for more than three decades, first in print and then on television, and he is the creator and host of The Takeout with Major Garrett, a weekly interview show and podcast on CBS News 24/7 where he talks with lawmakers and newsmakers over lunch. Garrett also fills in regularly as anchor on the CBS Evening News and Face the Nation.

His reputation rests on procedure. Garrett is the correspondent who reads the bill, follows the amendment and explains why a budget vote stalled at 2 a.m. That focus on legislative mechanics, built during his years at National Journal, has made him a fixture of CBS News political coverage through four presidential administrations. In 2026 he continues to file daily for CBS News and to publish new episodes of The Takeout. [edit]

Major Garrett was born in San Diego on August 24, 1962, and headed to the University of Missouri, one of the country's oldest journalism schools. He came out of it as a print reporter, not a broadcaster, and that mattered. His first sustained job in Washington was at National Journal, where he spent more than a decade covering Congress and fiscal policy.

Those years shaped everything that followed. While other reporters chased the podium, Garrett dug into the legislative machinery: the parliamentary maneuvers, the budget resolutions, the conference committees. He learned how a bill actually moves, and he learned it well enough that colleagues began treating him as a walking procedural reference. The work was not glamorous. It was, however, the kind of reporting that gets noticed by newsroom bosses looking for someone who can explain a government shutdown without shouting.

By the early 2000s he had built a reputation as a detail-heavy, plainspoken analyst of the institution. That reputation is what took him to television. Fox News hired him in 2002 as a senior White House correspondent, and the print reporter suddenly had a camera in front of him. He brought the same habits with him: read the document, know the process, explain it clearly. The transition from National Journal to the White House briefing room is the hinge on which his career turns. [edit]

Fox News put Garrett in front of a national audience in 2002 as senior White House correspondent, and he covered the George W. Bush years through the Iraq War and the 2004 reelection campaign. He stayed at Fox through the rest of the decade, adding the 2008 presidential cycle to his portfolio.

In 2010 he moved to CBS News as chief White House correspondent, a role that put him in the front row of the briefing room during the Obama administration. He later shifted to chief Washington correspondent, a broader beat that let him cover Congress, the Supreme Court and the politics of the capital as a whole. The job also made him a regular substitute anchor on the CBS Evening News and Face the Nation.

His book The Enduring Revolution arrived in 2015, a study of the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress and its long tail. Then came The Takeout, the lunch-interview show and podcast he created and hosts on CBS News 24/7. The format is simple: a table, a meal, a lawmaker, and questions that go past the talking points. Episodes continued daily through October 2026, and Garrett remains a fixture of CBS News political coverage across broadcast, streaming and digital. [edit]

Garrett's on-air presence is steady rather than flashy. He wears the dark suit, delivers the procedural detail, and rarely raises his voice. Viewers who watch CBS News regularly know him as the correspondent who can explain a budget reconciliation bill in ninety seconds without losing the thread, and that is the image he has cultivated: the process guy, the one who read the fine print.

On The Takeout, the register shifts. The show is built around a meal, and Garrett uses the table to loosen up his guests. The tone is conversational, sometimes wry, never sycophantic. He has described the show's spirit as not taking yourself too seriously, which is a useful posture for a journalist who spends most of his week covering people who do. [edit]

Major Garrett is a familiar face to anyone who watches CBS News, but he is not a celebrity in the tabloid sense, and iFANN has not yet collected fame data for him. He does not appear on the September 2026 iFAMOUS Rankings flagship list. His audience is the Sunday-morning political crowd, the people who know the difference between the House Rules Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee, and they tune in for his analysis rather than for his persona.

There is no fandom name, no organized fan campaign, no birthday billboard. What exists instead is a professional following: political junkies, Capitol Hill staffers and journalism students who cite his procedural reporting as a model. The Takeout has built a smaller, more devoted audience of its own, the kind that listens to the podcast on the commute and quotes the best exchanges back at friends. That is a different kind of fame, quieter and more durable, and it suits him. [edit]

His first name really is Major. It is not a rank, not a nickname, not a military title. Major Elliott Garrett was given the name at birth, a fact that has followed him through every byline and every broadcast.

He is a jazz fan, listing John Coltrane and Miles Davis among his favorites on his LinkedIn profile. He also acted as himself in an episode of House of Cards, one of several screen appearances that include political documentaries and CBS special reports.

His X bio reads like a mission statement: "This is a transmitter, not a receiver." It is the kind of line that tells you how he sees the job. Garrett has logged more than 1,200 television segments over his career, a number that reflects three decades of near-daily airtime rather than any single breakout moment. [edit]

Garrett is married to Lara Brown. The couple lives in the Washington, D.C., area, where he has been based for most of his career. Details about their wedding, their home and any children are not part of the public record in the sources available, and Garrett has kept that side of his life largely out of his professional profiles.

What is documented is the shape of his household: a two-person marriage in the capital, sustained through the long hours of a White House beat and the travel of four presidential campaigns. No divorce, separation or remarriage has been reported. For a correspondent whose job is to explain other people's decisions, Garrett has been notably quiet about his own domestic life. [edit]

CBS News, CBS News 24/7, National Journal, Fox News, The Takeout with Major Garrett, Face the Nation, CBS Evening News. [edit]

Major Garrett has been married to Lara Brown for years, and the public record contains no other romantic relationship. The two live in the Washington area, and neither has been the subject of divorce filings, separation reports or tabloid speculation. Garrett has kept his marriage out of his professional profiles, and interviews rarely touch on his home life.

As of 2026, he remains married to Brown. There is no reported change in status. [edit]

Major Garrett's income comes almost entirely from journalism. His salary as CBS News chief Washington correspondent is the foundation, supplemented by his work as creator and host of The Takeout and by occasional speaking engagements. There are no documented business ventures, endorsements or real-estate holdings that would add a second income stream, and no credible aggregator has published a specific figure for him.

The iFANN Editorial Team's analysis of his earnings and assets points to roughly $2 million as of 2026. That estimate reflects a long career at network and cable news operations, a book deal and a podcast, rather than any windfall. Garrett has spent more than three decades in the business, and the figure is consistent with a senior correspondent's accumulated savings rather than with celebrity-level wealth. [edit]