Rachael Bade

Rachael Bade is an American journalist who is a co-author of the Politico Playbook newsletter and a former political analyst for CNN. She spent two years reporting on U.S. Congress for The Washington Post. Early life and education Bade was raised in Ohio, and received a BA in political science and journalism from the University of Dayton in 2010. Before her journalism career, she was a classical ballet dancer, training during summers with Pacific Northwest Ballet, Ballet Austin and American Ballet Theatre. Career Bade started her journalism career in 2010 as a reporter for Congressional Quarterly and Roll Call. She joined Politico in 2012 to cover taxes, a beat that launched her career when the IRS targeting controversy broke. Bade closely followed the House Republican investigation of the IRS's treatment of conservative tax-exempt groups and was the only reporter to interview Lois Lerner, the IRS leader at the heart of the scandal who asserted her Fifth Amendment right on Capitol Hill, refusing to answer investigators' questions. Bade later covered the Republican Party's investigation of the 2012 Benghazi terrorist attack and the party's subsequent probe of Hillary Clinton's private email use. She was promoted to Politico's Congress team in early 2016, where she wrote about Speaker Paul Ryan's leadership, winning an award for a magazine profile that first reported on Ryan's decision to step down from Congress.