[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 42 (Friday, March 8, 2024)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E230-E231]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 HONORING THE LIFE OF MS. KAREN HOSLER

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. DEAN PHILLIPS

                              of minnesota

                    in the house of representatives

                         Friday, March 8, 2024

  Mr. PHILLIPS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life of Karen 
Hosler, a distinguished Baltimore Sun correspondent whose beats 
included Congress and the White House. Karen died on February 1 of this 
year, and it is an understatement to say that Karen lived life to its 
absolute fullest during her 75 years on this earth.
  Unfortunately, I did not have the opportunity to meet Karen, but I 
wish that I had. Those that worked with and knew her said, ``Karen 
always brightened up a room with her cheerfulness, her wonderful 
laughter, her joy for life and her deep commitment to first-rate 
journalism done the right way . . . She loved reporting on politics, be 
it Annapolis city government, the governor and General Assembly or the 
White House and Congress.
  Ms. Hosler earned a bachelor's degree in journalism in 1970 from the 
University of Maryland, College Park, where she was on the staff of The 
Diamondback, the campus newspaper. After college, she got her start 
right here in Congress working as a press aide to U.S. Senator Charles 
Mathias and then began covering politics for The Bowie Blade and Prince 
George's News. She then joined the staff in the early 1970s of what was 
then known as The Evening Capital in Annapolis, where she covered 
government, including the General Assembly and Anne Arundel County 
elections.
  Those that knew her in the newsroom describe her as ``. . . sassy, 
brassy and bold . . . She had the perfect reporter's combination of 
skepticism of what the government officials she was covering was 
telling her and empathy for the people she covered . . . She asked the 
questions that got right to the heart of things.''
  She then joined The Arundel Sun in 1977, and then went back to 
Annapolis, where she covered politics and state government. From 1980 
to 1983, she was the paper's state political reporter and from 1983 to 
1988 its Maryland correspondent.
  In 1988, she was named White House correspondent where she covered 
the administrations of Presidents Ronald W. Reagan, George H.W. Bush 
and Bill Clinton.
  In 2002, my colleague, Representative Steny Hoyer, included in the 
Congressional Record that Ms. Hosler was ``always a tough interrogator 
of a politician. She asked the hard questions that we didn't always 
like to answer, but she always got it out of us. She took her 
responsibility as a reporter very seriously and her readers were better 
off for it.''
  As if her professional accomplishments were not enough, Karen 
completed 12 marathons including the Boston, New York and Marine Corps 
marathons and brought her love of running to Washington. In fact, she 
even ran with President Bill Clinton and described the President as ``a 
whole lot faster than he looks.''
  In 1993, Karen became the congressional correspondent for The Sun 
until 1998, and its deputy Washington bureau chief from 1999 until 
2002.
  From 2008 until retiring in 2020, she was a WYPR talk show host, 
reporter and assignment editor.
  She was even the subject of a PBS special, which was based on a very 
personal piece written by Karen.
  In these times of political turmoil, it was inspiring to read Karen's 
story and see what it means to live a life well lived. Fair winds and 
following seas to Karen, and may her memory be a blessing to her 
husband and United States Naval Academy adjunct professor, Alan 
Friedman, and her brother, Richard Argy.

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