 | Thisbiography of a living personneeds additionalcitations forverification. Please help by addingreliable sources.Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced orpoorly sourcedmust be removed immediately from the article and its talk page, especially if potentiallylibelous. Find sources: "Tara Setmayer" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(May 2021) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Tara Setmayer | |
|---|---|
| Born | Tara Olivia Setmayer (1975-09-09)September 9, 1975 (age 50) New York City,New York, U.S. |
| Education | Paramus High School,New Jersey |
| Alma mater | George Washington University (BA) |
| Years active | 1998–present |
| Employer(s) | CNN,ABC |
| Political party | Republican (1993–2020) Independent (2020–present) |
| Website | Official website |
Tara Olivia Setmayer[1] (born September 9, 1975) is the co-founder and CEO ofThe Seneca Project. She is a former CNN political commentator, contributor to ABC News and former GOP communications director on Capitol Hill. She has appeared onABC'sThe View,[2] ABC'sGood Morning America, and onHBO'sReal Time with Bill Maher. On January 9, 2020, Setmayer was named as a Harvard Institute of Politics Spring 2020 Resident Fellow. Also in January 2020, she joinedThe Lincoln Project, where she served as a senior advisor and host of the live showThe Breakdown alongside co-founderRick Wilson, on the organization's streaming channel, LPTV, until June 2024 when she departed the organization without public explanation.
Setmayer is a University of Virginia Center for Politics Resident Scholar (2020–present.) In collaboration with the Center for Politics, she narrated the 3-part documentary,Dismantling Democracy, which aired nationally on PBS stations in September 2020 and is currently streaming on Amazon Prime.
After spending 27 years in political communications with the Republican Party, Setmayer publicly left the GOP in November 2020.
Setmayer was born in 1975 inQueens, New York, but raised inParamus, a borough ofBergen County in northernNew Jersey.[3] She is an only child, raised by a single mom, Deborah, who had been a Broadway dancer.[4] Deborah was 21 and single when Tara was born, and left her career to raise Tara.[5]
Tara's family has been longtime residents of Paramus. Her grandfather, Emil Setmayer, served 40 years with the Paramus Police Department, retiring as captain, and also spent 71 years with the Paramus Company 03 Volunteer Fire Department. She was educated atParamus High School, a public high school inBergen County,New Jersey, from which she graduated in 1993, followed byThe George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where she majored in political science with a focus on public policy and journalism.
Setmayer is of mixed heritage: Her mother is ofGerman andItalian descent and her father is ofAfro-Guatemalan descent.[6]
In the early 2000s, Setmayer served as a former research fellow and communications specialist for the Coalition on Urban Renewal & Education (CURE), a non-profit organization dealing with the impact of social policies on America's inner cities and the poor. She also served as a political trainer forGOPAC, a conservative organization specializing in educating, organizing and training grassroots Republicans intending to run for public office.[7]
For over two years, Setmayer served as a community liaison advocating on a variety of issues including affordable housing and services for the chronically homeless and children inSouth Florida where she co-founded a faith-based homeless program.
From 2006 to 2013, Setmayer worked in theU.S. House of Representatives as the Communications Director forRepublican RepresentativeDana Rohrabacher ofCalifornia, during which she handled immigration and federal law enforcement policy issues, and led the national effort to free Border Patrol AgentsIgnacio Ramos andJose Compean through a presidential commutation.[7]
She was a regular panelist on the women's issues programTo the Contrary onPBS, and was featured in several local and national publications includingThe Wall Street Journal,The Hill newspaper where she was included in the publication's annual50 Most Beautiful list in 2010, andEbony magazine, on terrestrial radio syndication and satellite,News & Notes andTell Me More onNPR andXM Radio.[7] As a media commentator, she has appeared on a range of television programs onCNN,CNN International,ABC,Fox News, MSNBC andHBO.[7]
In 2017, Setmayer was named as a board director forStand Up Republic, a non profit organization formed in the wake of the 2016 election of Donald Trump to unite Americans behind the defense of democratic norms, ideals and institutions.
Setmayer focuses her "tell it like it is" commentary and analysis on political issues that impact America's future. During the 2016 presidential election cycle, she earned the reputation of being an outspoken conservative critic ofDonald Trump and challenged his surrogates on the veracity of their claims.Vulture.com recognized her as one of 2016's "Top 20 Election Coverage Stars" on TV.
Prior to joining ABC, Setmayer was aCNN political commentator from 2014 through the 2016 presidential election cycle, regularly appearing on CNN'sNew Day,Erin Burnett OutFront,Anderson Cooper 360° andCNN Tonight with Don Lemon news analysis shows, and through 2017 subsequently appeared on CNN political panels, where she was credited as anABC News guest contributor. Setmayer rejoined CNN as a commentator in January 2018 through the inauguration of President Biden in January 2021. Today, she regularly appears as an on-air commentator on MSNBC and various other news outlets in the US and abroad.
She has written forCosmopolitan,Bloomberg Opinion,The Daily Beast,NBC Think andCNN.com. She is a frequent guest-host for TheMichael Smerconish Program onSiriusXM's POTUS channel.
In 2013, Setmayer married a federal law enforcement officer. Both are fans of theNew York Giants; their cat is namedTiki.[4] They live in the suburbs ofWashington, D.C.[4]
My mother is German-Italian, my father is from Guatemala, but I have, you know, I'm dark skinned. So what does that mean? And no one really knew.