‘Encyclopedic Knowledge of U.S. Politics’

Mark Shields, the renowned Democratic political journalist, columnist, and commentator for PBS, died on Saturday morning at the age of 85.

Shields’ passing was declared on Twitter by a single of his longtime colleagues, PBS NewsHour anchor and editor Judy Woodruff. Woodruff mentioned that Shields handed with his wife, Anne Hudson Shields, by his side. She also counseled him for his “a long time” of work with PBS and “his encyclopedic know-how of American politics.”

“I am heartbroken to share this,” Woodruff wrote in her tweet. “The NewsHour’s beloved long-time Friday night time analyst Mark Shields, who for a long time wowed us with his encyclopedic expertise of American politics, his perception of humor, and largely his large heart, has handed away at 85, with his wife Anne at his aspect.”

Shields started making weekly Friday appearances on NewsHour in 1988, presenting up-to-the-minute political analysis and discussion with a conservative counterpart, up right up until his retirement in 2020. His longest-serving counterpart was New York Periods columnist David Brooks, who appeared together with him from 2001 to 2020. Formerly, the role was crammed by the likes of William Safire, Paul Gigot, and David Gergen.

Born in Weymouth, Massachusetts, in 1937, Shields went on to graduate from the University of Notre Dame in 1959. Following graduation, he served in the United States Maritime Corps from 1960 to 1962, attaining the rank of lance corporal.

Shields entered the realm of politics in 1965, serving as an aide for Wisconsin Senator William Proxmire. Later on, he worked for the presidential marketing campaign of Robert F. Kennedy, and later held management positions in the strategies of presidential candidates like Edmund Muskie and Morris Udall.

He transitioned to political crafting in 1979, producing editorial articles for The Washington Post. Around the decades, he also served as a columnist for retailers like ABC and CNN. In 1985, he printed the guide, On the Campaign Path, about the 1984 presidential election.

As of Saturday, Shields’ trigger of dying is not acknowledged.

In response to his longtime colleague’s passing, Brooks shared a 2020 belief piece from The New York Periods he wrote on the event of Shields’s retirement, “Mark Shields and the Greatest of American Liberalism.” In his tweet from Saturday, Brooks termed the piece his “attempt to seize just one of the greatest and beloved guys I’ve ever identified,” and additional, “we will miss him.”

“We are all imprinted as kids and youthful grown ups with sure suggestions about the entire world, which remain with us for the relaxation of our lives,” Brooks wrote in 2020. “Mark, like quite a few who came of age in the 1950s and 1960s—including Joe Biden—was imprinted with the plan that politics is a deeply noble career, a variety of service, a vocation.”

Newsweek attained out to NewsHour for comment.