Howell Raines

Howell Hiram Raines (/ˈhaʊəl reɪns/; born February 5, 1943) is an American journalist. He was Executive Editor of The New York Times from 2001 until he left in 2003 in the wake of the Jayson Blair scandal. In 2008, he became a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio, writing the magazine's media column.

Raines was born in Birmingham, Alabama. He earned a bachelor's degree from Birmingham-Southern College in 1964 and later a master's in English from The University of Alabama, which also awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1993. In September 1964, Raines began his newspaper career as a reporter for the Birmingham Post-Herald in Alabama. He also reported for WBRC-TV in Birmingham. After a year as a reporter at the Birmingham News in 1971 he became political editor of the Atlanta Constitution. In 1976 he left that post to become political editor at the St. Petersburg Times.

Raines' affiliation with The New York Times began in 1978, when he joined as a national correspondent based in Atlanta. By 1979, Raines was Atlanta's bureau chief, a position he held until 1981, when he became a national political correspondent. By the next year, Raines had advanced to become a White House correspondent for The Times. He progressed to management in 1985, becoming deputy Washington editor. In 1987, Raines transferred to London and worked as the newspaper's London bureau chief. The next year, he returned to Washington D.C. to become the city's bureau chief. In 1992, "Grady's Gift", a narrative of his childhood in Alabama with a focus on the family's black housekeeper, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing. His longest-lasting assignment with The Times began in 1993, when he left Washington for New York to become the paper's editorial page editor, a position he held for eight years. The aggressive, colloquial style of his editorials, especially those critical of President Clinton and his administration, drew widespread notice and a share of criticism, not least because it differed from the measured tone for which Times editorials had been known.

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