Ana Navarro | |
|---|---|
 Navarro in November 2017 | |
| Born | Ana Violeta Navarro Flores (1971-12-28)December 28, 1971 (age 53) Chinandega, Nicaragua |
| Alma mater | University of Miami (BA) St. Thomas University (JD) |
| Occupation(s) | Political commentator, strategist |
| Employers | |
| Spouse | |
Ana Violeta Navarro-Cárdenas (néeNavarro Flores;[1] born December 28, 1971)[2] is a Nicaraguan-Americanpolitical strategist and commentator. She appears on various television programs and news outlets, includingCNN,CNN en Español,[3]ABC News, andTelemundo.[4] She is also a co-host of daytime talk showThe View,[5] garneringDaytime Emmy Award nominations for her work.
She has been a vocal critic of Republican presidentDonald Trump and his administration.[6][7] She spoke in support ofKamala Harris's presidential campaign at the2024 Democratic National Convention and supportedHillary Clinton andJoe Biden in their presidential campaigns.[8]
Born in 1971 to a wealthy land-owning agricultural family inNicaragua,[9] Navarro is the daughter of Violeta Flores López and José Augusto Navarro Flores, a former minister of agriculture under the administration ofEnrique Bolaños Geyer.[1] She and her family moved to the United States in 1980 because of political turmoil,[1] though her father, who had also been persecuted as an opponent of theSomoza regime, stayed behind to continue to fight with theContras against theSandinista government.[10][11] She later said that thenU.S. presidentRonald Reagan'ssupport of the Contras made her a lifelong Republican.[12]
Navarro attended theCarrollton School of the Sacred Heart, a private Catholiccollege preparatory day school for girls inCoconut Grove,Miami.[13] Navarro earned abachelor's degree inLatin American studies and political science in 1993 from theUniversity of Miami. In 1997, she earned herJuris Doctor fromSt. Thomas University School of Law.[14]
During her first year in university, Navarro campaigned for aid to the Contras.[9] As a law student, Navarro successfully fought to keep Nicaraguan refugees from being deported during the mid-nineties.[12]
Navarro was a member of theRepublican Party.[15][8] She served in a number of Republican administrations, including as part of the transition team forFlorida governorJeb Bush in 1998 and also as Bush's director of immigration policy. She also served as ambassador to theUnited Nations Commission on Human Rights, where she condemned human rights violations inCuba. She later served as national co-chair of the Hispanic Advisory Council forJohn McCain in 2008 andJon Huntsman Jr. in 2012.[9]
In February 2014, she became a political commentator atABC News.[16] In addition, she is also a political commentator onCNN andCNN en Español.[13] Navarro became a contributor onABC daytime talk showThe View in 2013.[17] She joined the series as a weekly guest co-host in 2018 and a permanent co-host in 2022.[18] She receivedDaytime Emmy Award nominations forOutstanding Informative Talk Show Host in 2020 and 2022 as well asOutstanding Daytime Talk Series Host in 2024.[19][20][21]
Navarro supported Jeb Bush's2016 presidential campaign.[22] In October 2016, she made headlines when she strongly criticized Republican presidential nomineeDonald Trump on CNN after theDonald Trump and Billy Bush recording surfaced, and she called for party leaders to disown Trump.[23][24] She also harshly criticized Trump's comments about immigrants, labeling him a racist.[25] Navarro has been labeled a "Never Trumper."[26] She voted for Democratic presidential nomineeHillary Clinton, stating that she decided to do so after seeing how close therace in Florida had become.[22]
Navarro was a vocal opponent ofRoy Moore in the2017 Alabama Senate election, due to theallegations of sexual assault and molestation against him.[27] In the2018 Florida gubernatorial election, after having previously been a "lifelong Republican", Navarro voted for DemocratAndrew Gillum over RepublicanRon DeSantis because of DeSantis's ties to Trump.[28]
On August 11, 2020, she stated that she would be voting for Democratic presidential candidateJoe Biden in the2020 United States presidential election.[29] She andGeorge Lopez hosted an online concert fundraiser for Biden on October 25, 2020.[30]
She is a strong supporter of LGBTQ+ rights. In February 2013, Navarro publicly supported legalization ofsame-sex marriage in anamicus curiae brief submitted to theU.S. Supreme Court.[31] In 2017 she spoke out against theTrump Administration'sban on Transgender Individuals serving in the military, calling it "repugnant".[32] In 2019, she was given the Ally Leadership Award byEquality California for her activism in support of the LGBTQ+ community.[33] In 2022, she criticized passage of theFlorida Parental Rights in Education Act, calling it "completely unnecessary" and in 2023, spoke out againstDrag Panic and anti-drag legislation, saying, "I hate how drag queens are being made into a political issue, into a manufactured, made-up cultural issue, because I tell you what: No drag queen ever killed a little kid ... Guns kill little kids If you care about children and their safety, go after the guns, and leave the f*cking drag queens alone!”[34][35]
Afterthe Supreme Court overturnedRoe v. Wade—which had legalizedabortion nationwide—while personallypro-life, she spoke out in support ofabortion rights, citing family members who have difficulty caring for relatives withphysical anddevelopmental disabilities.[36]
The day after theRobb Elementary School shooting in May 2022, Navarro declared strong support for increased gun control efforts, including anassault weapons ban. She criticized theNational Rifle Association of America and othergun lobby groups, as well as officials in her own party, saying, "I would like Republicans to show the same energy that they do for banning books, and banning conversations about gays, and banning conversations about black history, and regulating my uterus, I want them to show the same energy for banning guns."[37]
Navarro was supportive of Democratic nomineeKamala Harris in the2024 United States presidential election, and acted as officialemcee of the second evening of the2024 Democratic National Convention.[38][39]
On December 2, 2024, while defending Joe Biden for pardoning his son Hunter, Navarro tweeted that President Woodrow Wilson pardoned his brother-in-law Hunter deButts. This did not happen and Wilson never had a brother-in-law with that name. When confronted with the error, Navarro challenged "Twitter sleuths" to "take it up withChatGPT".[40]
Navarro resides inMiami.[12][41] She married lawyer and lobbyistAl Cárdenas on March 2, 2019.[42]
In 2020, Navarro was named byCarnegie Corporation of New York as an honoree of theGreat Immigrants Award.[43]
