Dana Loesch

Dana Loesch (pronounced DAY-nə LASH, née Eaton, born September 28, 1978) is an American conservative talk radio host, television host at TheBlaze and author of Hands Off My Gun: Defeating the Plot to Disarm America. Loesch has appeared as a political commentator on Fox News, CNN, CBS, ABC and HBO among many others.

Early life

Loesch was raised by her mother, Gale, in an extended family of Southern Baptists. She graduated from Fox High School in Arnold, Missouri. She later attended St. Louis Community College at Meramec before transferring to Webster University to study journalism on scholarship. Following a pregnancy, Loesch dropped out of college and married, having her first child when she was 21. She grew up as a Democrat, a point of contention early in her marriage to Chris, a staunch Republican. However, she veered sharply to the right after the September 11 attacks. Loesch and her husband homeschooled two children together.

Career

After leaving Webster University, Loesch began writing for St. Louis Magazine, doing investigative news articles and began her website "Mamalogues". Dana allowed the St. Louis Post Dispatch to run with "Mamalogues" as a weekly column, which won Loesch the Riverfront Times' "Best Newspaper Columnist St. Louis 2007". Loesch started hosting her radio show in 2008 which is now a nationally syndicated, daily program "The Dana Show: The Conservative Alternative" on Radio America from flagship station KFTK-FM in St. Louis, Missouri and is also featured on stations around the country. In July 2008 Loesch was chosen as one of St. Louis Business Journal's top 30 Under 30. She was recognized by the Nielsen ratings as one of the Top 50 Most Powerful Mom Bloggers. In October 2010, Loesch was hired to be editor-in-chief of Big Journalism, a conservative website created by Andrew Breitbart. In February 2011, CNN hired Loesch as a political analyst in preparation for its 2012 election coverage.