Michelle Fields is a household name in American political journalism. She is one of many women to have gotten into a controversy with then-presidential hopeful Donald Trump during his run for the nation’s top seat. Fields had filed a complaint against Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski for grabbing and shoving her while she was trying to ask Trump her questions. Here’s everything you need to know about Michelle Fields in 5 quick but detailed facts.
5 Facts You Should Know About Michelle Fields
1. Fields has Honduran roots and is originally from California.
Michelle Fields was born on January 10, 1988, in Los Angeles where she attended Calabasas High School in Calabasas, California. She was raised by her Honduran grandmother who taught her to speak Spanish. Fields was born in Xiomara Fields, and Greg Fielddad, the last, his father, Greg Fields, is a television and film writer. Michelle attended Pepperdine University, where she graduated in political science in 2011.
2. Michelle Fields’ style of journalism, she is compared to citizen journalism.
Simply put, citizen journalism is when an individual with little journalism training or basic journalism education has the basic tools necessary for journalism (including modern technology) to collect and disseminate information. Citizen journalism is also a confrontational style of journalism. Fresh out of college in 2001, Michelle gained national recognition after her chat with actor Matt Damon about teacher tenure reform.
At the time of her confrontation with Damon, Fields was working as a reporter for the Daily Caller. She then became a contributor for Fox News in September 2014 before becoming a political reporter for Breitbart News in November 2015.
3. Her argument with Donald Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski led her to resign from Breitbart News.
Fields joined Breitbart News’ online platform on March 10, 2016, to report on what happened between her and Corey Lewandowski after a press conference in Jupiter, Florida on March 8, 2016. According to her story, she was attempting to ask the presidential candidate questions when suddenly someone’s arm violently grabbed her, jerking her sharply, causing her to jerk back as she managed to maintain her stamina.
Fields said she couldn’t recognize immediately because of the crowd, but Ben Terris of the Washinton Post quickly told her the helping hand came from Troy Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s campaign manager.
After her story hit the waves, the Trump campaign immediately denied her claims, after which Fields took to Twitter to post a photo of her bruised left arm with visible fingerprints. A Twitter fight later ensued between her and Trump.
On March 11, 2016, Fields surrendered to the Jupiter Police Department to file a criminal complaint against Lewandowski, who was charged with simple battery on March 29. After investigations, prosecutors dismissed the case on April 14, saying that although Corey grabbed Fields’ arms against his will, the evidence was “insufficient to support a criminal prosecution.”
Her employer Breitbart issued a statement demanding an apology from the Trump camp if the story she told them was true, however, on March 13, 2016, Fields had resigned from her position due to her dissatisfaction with the way Breitbart had handled the question.
4. Fields was with the Huffington Post two months after his resignation from Breitbart.
In May 2016 Fields began reporting for the Huffington Post and in June 2016 she published a book Barons of the Beltway: Into the Princely World of Our Washington Elite which included details of the incident.
Fields has made appearances on other news platforms such as Sky News, Fox and Friends, CNBC, The O’Reilly Factor, America’s Newsroom, and more. She was once a panel member for the Fox News program Cashin’ In.
5. She is married to fellow political journalist, Jamie Weinstein.
During the time of her controversy with Lewandowski, Michelle Fields was in a relationship with a political journalist, opinion commentator and satirist, Jamie Weinstein. It was Weinstein who first took to his Twitter account to report the Fields incident captured at Jupiter’s press conference. The Twitter post in which he called Lewandowski a thug garnered a lot of attention, after which Fields addressed the incident herself.
Weinstein and Fields got engaged in late May 2016 and married on June 24, 2017.