Antonio Mora Biography

}} Antonio Mora (born December 14, 1957, Havana, Cuba) is a multiple Emmy Award winning journalist and television news anchor. He is currently the host of Consider This on Al Jazeera America. He is best known for his years at ABC News, including his four years as the news anchor and chief correspondent for Good Morning America. He was the first Hispanic American male to anchor a primetime newscast in Chicago and one of the only Hispanic American males to anchor a national broadcast news show.

Personal

Mora's family left Cuba in 1960. He grew up in the United States and Caracas, Venezuela. He received an LL.M. from Harvard Law School and a law degree, summa cum laude, from the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello in Caracas. Before becoming a broadcaster, he was a corporate finance attorney at Debevoise & Plimpton in Manhattan. He is the great grandson of Cuban politician and League of Nations President Cosme de la Torriente y Peraza. He is the brother of former ATP touring pro, Alfonso Mora, brother-in-law of TV host Maite Delgado and former brother-in-law of model Ines Rivero.

Professional

Mora began his broadcasting career as a sports anchor and reporter for Univision's New York station WXTV. He then worked as an anchor and producer for Telemundo's New York station, WNJU-TV. He was one of the original announcers for ESPN's international transmissions to Latin America and one of the original anchors for NBC News Nightside the overnight national newscast for the NBC Network. He then served as a reporter and anchor for WTVJ in Miami and was the original co-host of Good Day L.A. for KTTV in Los Angeles, before being hired by ABC as the host of Good Morning America Sunday and correspondent for Good Morning America. He later reported for virtually all of ABC News' broadcasts, including Nightline and 20/20, covering news from more than a dozen countries on four continents. He also anchored ABC News' breaking news coverage and served as a correspondent for World News Tonight with Peter Jennings and as a regular substitute anchor for the weekend edition of World News Tonight. In 1998, he became the news anchor for Good Morning America at the time when Diane Sawyer and Charles Gibson became the co-hosts of the show. Four years later, he left for Chicago where he served as the main anchor at the CBS owned-and-operated WBBM-TV until 2008. He was a news anchor at CBS owned-and-operated WFOR-TV in Miami until December 17, 2012. He is an experienced debate moderator, having moderated gubernatorial debates in Illinois and Florida, and senatorial and congressional debates in Florida. On July 26, 2013 he was hired to host a weeknight current affairs talk show called Consider This on Al Jazeera America

Awards

Mora has received awards for reporting, anchoring, breaking-news anchoring, interviewing and commentary. His honors include two Peabody Awards, a national Edward R. Murrow Award, two national Emmy Awards, nine local Emmy Awards and a Silver Dome. He was named one of the country's "100 Most Influential Hispanics" by Hispanic Business Magazine in 1999. He received honorary doctorates from Our Lady of Holy Cross College and Ursinus College.

Associations and charitable work

He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and is a former Vice President of Broadcast for the National Association of Hispanic Journalists. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Foundation and a volunteer with the United States Tennis Association. He has served as a member of the boards of trustees of the Goodman Theatre, the Chicago Children's Choir and the Latin School of Chicago. He maintains active involvement in many non-profit organizations and charities.

Film credit and other activities

He had a cameo appearance in the 1994 film Speed starring Sandra Bullock. Mora recently gained notoriety on YouTube after a video of him breaking into a fit of laughter with WFOR co-anchor Shannon Hori when reading a story about injuries suffered during sex that included "fractured penises" went viral and was featured on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.