At the height of the Cold War, as a high school freshman, CNN’s Jill Dougherty developed an obsession with Russia. Over the next half-century, she studied in Leningrad, traveled across the Soviet Union, lived in Moscow, and reported on the presidencies of Mikhail Gorbachev, Boris Yeltsin, and Vladimir Putin. Jill’s life and Putin’s intersected. They studied at the same Russian university; Jill was named CNN Moscow Bureau Chief just as Putin began his rise to power. She knew he was a former KGB officer, but she also believed he was an economic reformer. As Putin tightened his grip on the media, she changed her mind. In 2022, reporting from Moscow as Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine, she was convinced the leader with whom she once had sympathized was a tyrant threatening to destroy a country she had come to love.

My Russia charts Russia’s evolution through the eyes of an American with rare insight into Russia, its people, and its leaders.

Dougherty was a CNN correspondent for over 30 years. She now is a CNN on-air contributor, reporting and analyzing events in Russia and the region. She will be in conversation with Alex Marquardt, CNN’s Chief National Security Correspondent. 

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