Tom Bowman
Tom Bowman is a NPR National Desk reporter covering the Pentagon.
In his current role, Bowman has traveled to Syria as well as Iraq and Afghanistan often for month-long visits and embedded with U.S. Marines and soldiers.
Before coming to NPR in April 2006, Bowman spent nine years as a Pentagon reporter at The Baltimore Sun. Altogether he was at The Sun for nearly two decades, covering the Maryland Statehouse, the U.S. Congress, the U.S. Naval Academy, and the National Security Agency (NSA). His coverage of racial and gender discrimination at NSA led to a Pentagon investigation in 1994.
Initially Bowman imagined his career path would take him into academia as a history, government, or journalism professor. During college Bowman worked as a stringer at The Patriot Ledger in Quincy, Mass. He also worked for the Daily Transcript in Dedham, Mass., and then as a reporter at States News Service, writing for the Miami Herald and the Anniston (Ala.) Star.
Bowman is a co-winner of a 2006 National Headliners' Award for stories on the lack of advanced tourniquets for U.S. troops in Iraq. In 2010, he received an Edward R. Murrow Award for his coverage of a Taliban roadside bomb attack on an Army unit.
Bowman earned a Bachelor of Arts in history from St. Michael's College in Winooski, Vermont, and a master's degree in American Studies from Boston College.
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For the first time, Ukraine has fired U.S. ballistic missiles into Russia as part of heavy ongoing fighting. Russia is expressing strong opposition and says this marks an escalation in the war.
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President Biden has authorized Ukraine to use U.S.-supplied long-range missiles against targets inside Russia.
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The selection of Fox News host Pete Hegseth to lead the Trump Defense Department has renewed scrutiny of his political and religious views and his aggressive criticism of the military he'd be leading. -
President-elect Donald Trump has announced he will nominate Pete Hegseth, a Fox News host and Army veteran to be his secretary of defense. The 44-year-old Hegseth came as a surprise.
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As national security adviser, the Florida congressman will play a key role in shaping U.S. policy on geopolitical conflicts ranging from the war in Ukraine to the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. -
Donald Trump's first presidency was marked by near-constant turnover of senior personnel. For his second run, the focus seems to be on hiring loyalists who won't challenge the president's wishes.
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A Marine and his buddies joined the mob that entered the Capitol on Jan. 6. They were not the only Marines there. NPR asked the Corps' top officer a question: Do the Marines have an extremism problem? -
The heavily redacted report focuses on an August altercation at Arlington National Cemetery involving two campaign staffers for former President Donald Trump and a cemetery employee. -
The new NPR podcast debuts Friday. It tells the story of Sergeant Josh Abate, who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 along with two of his fellow Marines.
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In this podcast highlight, listeners are introduced to the story of an active-duty Marine who participated in the events on Jan. 6, and why it opens up larger questions about extremism in the ranks.
