Kim Brunhuber is an award-winning CNN news anchor who strode across various newsroom tasks before becoming the host of the CNN Newsroom’s Europe morning editions aired on weekends. So how did he traverse the broadcasting journey from CBC to CNN?
Starting Off with CTV in Canada
Even before getting associated with CBC, Kim started his career at CTV, an English terrestrial television network based out of Canada, in 1997. During his time at the network, he anchored, produced, and reported on various news stories, including the dreadful crash of Swissair Flight 111 in September 1998.
It was during his time at CTV that he covered some of the most dreadful happenings of the time. One such instance is his coverage of the suicide bombing in Kabul, Afghanistan, which resulted in the killing of dozens of people.
A Brief Period at JHR
After dedicating his significant early years of work at CTV, Kim moved to CBC, the Canada Broadcasting Corporation. However, while switching between the two networks, he worked in Sierra Leone in West Africa and served as a senior trainer for Journalists for Human Rights (JHR), a media development organization.
A number of his on-ground reports and coverages for JHR were used as journalism training pieces on investigative reporting for upcoming journalists. One such report was about an environmental disaster wherein it was found that it was linked to a former government minister in Sierra Leone. The story was published in Concord Times on 7th September 2007 and took two weeks to film and edit by Kim. He also extensively covered the west coast country’s general election, human rights issues such as female genital mutilation, and the prevalence of child labor in the mining industry.
Brunhuber went on to explore and work as a freelance correspondent and producer meanwhile making documentaries from across the world, covering news reports, and doing live commentary. His area of work expanded well beyond Canada and Sierra Leone, spanning across Asia and Africa, including countries such as Pakistan, Afghanistan, Mali, and Ghana.
Early Days of Reporting & Anchoring at CBC
Kim spent a good thirteen years working as both a correspondent and anchor at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC TV) in his home country Canada. Two of his major positions of work were as Los Angeles bureau chief, starting in 2015, and later scaling as the network’s senior correspondent.
It was during his time at CBC that he dug and came up with some of the most pressing yet under-discussed stories of the time. One such instance is his coverage of the plight of the Hazara community in Afghanistan, the descendants of the Mongolian empire founder Genghis Khan, who continue to remain persecuted. While working with the Canadian network in Toronto, Kim presented several shows on CBC TV, one of them being the Saturday broadcast of The National (watch 40:07 onwards).
These were the years when Brunhuber nurtured and flourished his filming, shooting, and editing skills that brought great stories and footage to the front. For the network’s show titled Around the World, Kim wrote, filmed, and edited a story from the far-off land of Timbuktu in Mali, West Africa. The story captured the journey of a group of Inuit from a disadvantaged community in the country who trekked thousands of miles to perform at a festival in the desert in Timbuktu.
A look at some more of his work done at CBC tells us that he has been proficient in reporting. For instance, in this video story reported on the status of the US-Mexico border wall from six years ago, Kim can be seen shooting and narrating the current scenario of the fencing. Practically enough, he lowers the camera under the fences and even gives a fair idea of how tall it is by actually touching them and comparing it with his height. Just what a reporter must do to give their viewers a better and real understanding!
To give the viewers a closer look at the everyday lives of the people of New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina, Kim went on the streets to get an in-depth perspective. Here’s what can be seen in the video report for the CBC. He explains that more visitors and startups can be seen emerging in the city, which is sixty percent higher than the national average as compared to pre-Katrina times when it was below that level. However, drawing the viewer’s attention to the contrast, he mentions the uneven growth within the city and narrates the story throughout.
His area of work was well extended to covering diverse events for CBC News such as the 2016 Olympics held in Rio de Janeiro, the 2010 FIFA World Cup, major U.S. and international news stories, and the death of Nelson Mandela. He also reported on a number of mass shootings that took place in the U.S., including Las Vegas, San Bernardino, and Thousand Oaks, CA.
Reporting from Knee-Deep Waters
On-ground reporting is a familiar thing for many but reporting from the waters in an interestingly unusual way is what Kim did for one of his pieces. In this report from Bowmanville in Canada, Kim can be seen helping the Salmons of Lake Ontario in an unusual way by getting inside knee-deep water along with the crew or as they call them ‘fish whisperers’.
Moving to CNN Newsroom
As an anchor for CNN International in Atlanta, U.S., Kim Brunhuber hosts Europe’s morning editions of CNN Newsroom on Saturday and Sunday, as well as weekday news programs on the channel since mid-2020.
In the first week of June 2020, Mike McCarthy, the Executive Vice President and General Manager of CNN International announced the joining of Kim Brunhuber as an Atlanta-based anchor for the channel. About joining the network, Kim said “While on assignment or living abroad, I could always count on meeting up with one of my favorite travel companions: CNN International. Whether I was in a three-walled barbershop in Freetown, an expat hotel in Karachi, or a boisterous shebeen in Cape Town, the network was the umbilical cord keeping me connected to the rest of the world. I’m thrilled that now I’ll be on the other side of the desk. I can’t imagine a better platform for international storytelling nor a more crucial time in which those stories must be told.”
Kim has proved to be a promising news anchor on the channel as he hosts one of its key programs, CNN Newsroom with elegance and experience. Take a look at one of the episodes of CNN Newsroom with Kim Brunhuber from November 2022.
Achievements & Accolades
Kim won the 2018 National Press Club Award in the breaking news-broadcast category for his excellent coverage of the massive fires in Southern California in 2017.
He also authored the book Kameleon Man in 2003 which was nominated for the 2004 ReLit Award and the 2004 Ottawa Book Award. The book deals with the male modeling world and the challenges in it with Stacey Schmidt as its main character. It deals in depth with the issues such as gender, sexuality, and glamour of the industry in modern times.
The Little-Known Personal Life
Born in Montreal and now residing in Atlanta, Kim is fluent in French and Spanish. He earned both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in journalism from Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. He is married to Zulekha Nathoo, a producer and host at USA Today and the couple has a son named Amari Brunhuber.
By: Mahima Rabia
