Julie Marie Pace (born March 16, 1982) is an American journalist from

Buffalo, New York Buffalo is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of New York (behind only New York City) and the seat of Erie County. It is at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River, and is across the Canadian border from South ...

. She was named as the executive editor and senior vice president of the

Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...

on September 1, 2021. Pace moves to the position after working as AP's Washington, D.C. bureau chief since 2017. She has worked at the AP since 2007 as a political journalist.

Early life

Pace is the daughter of James J. Pace and Diane M. Pace. Her father is the owner of I.G.S. Landscaping, which is a lawn maintenance company headquartered in Amherst. Pace's mother is a supervisor of radiology at D.I.A./Invision Health of Williamsville, New York State. She is a 2000 graduate of

Amherst Central High School Amherst Central High School (ACHS) is a public High school (North America), high school in Snyder, New York, Snyder, New York (state), New York, United States, a Hamlet (New York), hamlet within the town of Amherst, New York, Amherst, which is wit ...

and a 2004 graduate of the

Medill School of Journalism The Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications is a constituent school of Northwestern University that offers both undergraduate and graduate programs. It frequently ranks as the top school of journalism in the Unite ...

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...

Career

After graduation she worked for a year as a journalist in South African independent television station

e.tv e.tv (commonly referred to on-air as e) is the first and only privately owned free-to-air television station in South Africa. It is the fifth terrestrial television channel in the country, following three channels that are operated by the sta ...

Africa, and then spent two years at ''

The Tampa Tribune ''The Tampa Tribune'' was a daily newspaper published in Tampa, Florida. Along with the competing ''Tampa Bay Times'', the ''Tampa Tribune'' was one of two major newspapers published in the Tampa Bay area. The newspaper also published a ''St. Pe ...

'' before joining the

(AP) in 2007 as a video producer. She was the AP's first multimedia political journalist. Pace covered the 2008 presidential election and began covering the White House in 2009 when Barack Obama took office. In 2013 she was named chief White House correspondent and in 2017 was promoted to Washington bureau chief. One of her major acts as bureau chief was the expansion of the

fact-checking Fact-checking is the process of verifying factual information, in order to promote the veracity and correctness of reporting. Fact-checking can be conducted before (''ante hoc'') or after (''post hoc'') the text is published or otherwise dissem ...

division, as well as publishing explanatory articles on how the A.P. calculates votes and projects the victors of political elections, an integral part of the A.P. since 1848. She is succeeding

Sally Buzbee Sally Streff Buzbee is an American journalist and editor and the executive editor of ''The Washington Post''. Before joining the ''Post'', Buzbee worked at the Associated Press for more than three decades, serving as executive editor and senior ...

, who in May was named as the first woman executive editor of The Washington Post. Pace is the third consecutive female executive editor of the Associated Press, following Buzbee and Kathleen Carroll, who held the role from 2002 to 2016.

Personal life

In 2014 she married Michael Ferenczy, a viral researcher at the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pace, Julia 20th-century American women journalists Medill School of Journalism alumni People from Buffalo, New York Writers from Buffalo, New York Television personalities from Buffalo, New York Associated Press reporters Living people American women editors 20th-century American journalists 21st-century American journalists 21st-century American women journalists 1982 births Amherst Central High School Alumni American political journalists