Veteran CBS political correspondent Roger Mudd dies at 93

Veteran CBS News political correspondent Roger Mudd died on Tuesday from kidney failure at the age of 93.

The Washington Post first reported news of Mudd’s death.

He covered Capitol Hill for nearly 20 years.

Mudd was born on Feb. 9, 1928, to a father who was a cartographer and engineer, the Post reported. He graduated from Washington and Lee University in 1950 and received a master’s degree in history in 1953.

“Roger was a hero in the CBS News Washington bureau,” CBS News President and Executive Producer Susan Zirinsky said in a statement provided to The Hill. “He was a journalist of enormous integrity and character. He would not budge if he believed he was right and would not compromise his ethical standards. He was an inspiration to all of us in the bureau. On a personal note — I sat directly across from him in the D.C. newsroom — Roger was big, not just in his physical presence but he was larger than life.”

He first began his career in Washington in 1956 as a radio and television reporter for CBS affiliate WTOP before later joining CBS’s Washington bureau.

One of his most notable interviews was with then-presidential candidate Ted Kennedy, the brother of former President Kennedy. Mudd’s direct questions and Kennedy’s incomplete, evasive answers effectively ended his presidential bid.

Mudd was expected to succeed CBS evening news anchor Walter Cronkite when he retired but was passed over for Dan Rather. This resulted in Mudd temporarily leaving for rival network NBC, where he co-anchored with Tom Brokaw.

His wife Emma Jeanne “E.J.” Spears died in 2011. They were married for 53 years, according to the Post.

He is survived by four children, 14 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Updated at 5:56 p.m.