Tyler Bridges is an American reporter for The Advocate/The Times-Picayune who has contributed to ''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'', ''
Politico
''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American, German-owned political journalism newspaper company based in Arlington County, Virginia, that covers politics and policy in the United States and intern ...
'', and other publications. He was previously a reporter for The Lens (a non-profit digital newsroom based in New Orleans), ''
The Miami Herald
The ''Miami Herald'' is an American daily newspaper owned by the McClatchy Company and headquartered in Doral, Florida, a city in western Miami-Dade County and the Miami metropolitan area, several miles west of Downtown Miami.The Times-Picayune''. Bridges has reported on
New Orleans
New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...
and
Louisiana
Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
, and attended
Palo Alto High School
Palo Alto Senior High School, commonly referred to locally as "Paly", is a comprehensive public high school in Palo Alto, California. Operated by the Palo Alto Unified School District, the school is one of two schools in the district, the other b ...
. In 1982, he graduated with a degree in
political science
Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and power, and the analysis of political activities, political thought, political behavior, and associated constitutions and la ...
from
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
, where he was a member of the Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band.
Career
From 1982 to 1984, Bridges was the editor of ''People & Taxes'', a monthly newspaper published by Ralph Nader's Public Citizen. From 1984 to 1986, he was a reporter for The Daily Journal, the English-language newspaper in Caracas, Venezuela.
From 1986 to 1989, he was a freelance journalist in
South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...
, reporting from various countries. From 1989 to 1996, Bridges was a reporter for The Times-Picayune of New Orleans. His coverage of David Duke, the former
Ku Klux Klan
The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and ...
grand wizard who at the time was in the process of briefly gaining political office in Louisiana, resulted in Bridges's first book, ''The Rise of David Duke,'' published in 1994.
Between 1992 and 1996, Bridges also covered the legalization of
gambling
Gambling (also known as betting or gaming) is the wagering of something of value ("the stakes") on a random event with the intent of winning something else of value, where instances of strategy are discounted. Gambling thus requires three el ...
in Louisiana. This became the subject of his next book, ''Bad Bet on the Bayou: The Rise of Gambling in Louisiana and The Fall of Governor Edwin Edwards''.
After leaving the ''Times-Picayune'', Bridges went to work for the ''Miami Herald'', for which he served as chief political correspondent, based in
Miami
Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
on a Nieman Fellowship, studying the coverage of politics and government in digital media.
On September 19, 2012, Bridges became a staff writer for ''The Lens'', a digital news site in New Orleans.
Writing for ''
Politico
''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American, German-owned political journalism newspaper company based in Arlington County, Virginia, that covers politics and policy in the United States and intern ...
'' in November 2016, Bridges recounted his experience watching former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke in his race for New Orleans Senate seat of retiring U.S. Senator David Vitter in 2016. Bridges sat in on the statewide television debate held at the historically black college,
Dillard University
Dillard University is a private, historically black university in New Orleans, Louisiana. Founded in 1930 and incorporating earlier institutions founded as early as 1869 after the American Civil War, it is affiliated with the United Church of Ch ...
.
Personal life
From 2008 to 2019, Bridges was married to
Cecilia Tait
Cecilia Roxana Tait Villacorta (born May 2, 1962) is a Peruvian politician and retired volleyball player. Nicknamed ''La Zurda del Oro'' (''The Golden Left-Handed Woman''), she participated in three Summer Olympics with the Peru national team, ...
, who was a prominent member of the silver medal-winning Peruvian women's volleyball team at the 1988 Olympics in
Seoul
Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 ...
. She was known as "the golden left arm." Bridges and Tait were a couple for eight years and had a daughter together, Luciana, before marrying on September 14, 2008. Tait also has another daughter, Laura from a previous relationship. Bridges and Tait divorced in 2019.