He is a member of the Bar of New York, the Bloomberg Professor of Business and Economic Journalism at the
Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism,[1] Editor-at-Large of SmartMoney magazine, and author of Tangled Webs: How False Statements are Undermining America: From Martha Stewart to Bernie Madoff (2011).[2] He is a former associate at New York law firm
Cravath, Swaine & Moore, which he left in 1979 to become executive editor of The American Lawyer magazine.[3] He later joined The Wall Street Journal, where earned the 1987
Gerald Loeb Award for Deadline and/or Beat Writing.[4] He shared the 1988
Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Journalism and the Gerald Loeb Award for Large Newspapers for his articles about the 1987 dramatic upheaval in the
stock market and
insider trading. These writings led to the publishing of his best-selling work of non-fiction called Den of Thieves (1991), which recounted the criminal conduct of Wall Street arbitrager
Ivan Boesky and
junk bond king
Michael Milken.[5] Stewart became page one editor of The Wall Street Journal in 1988 and remained at the paper until 1992, when he left to help found SmartMoney.[3]
Stewart's book Blind Eye: The Terrifying Story Of A Doctor Who Got Away With Murder (1999), won the 2000
Edgar Award in the Best Fact Crime category. DisneyWar (2005), his book on
Michael Eisner's reign at Disney, won the Gerald Loeb Award for Best Business Book.[6] In 2007, he was ranked 21st on Out magazine's 50 Most Powerful Gay Men and Women in America.[7] He is currently a contributor to The New Yorker and a columnist for The New York Times, which he joined in 2011.[3] Stewart also serves on the board of advisory trustees of his alma mater,
DePauw University, and is past president of that board.[8]
Notable stories
Jeffrey Epstein
On August 12, 2019, Stewart reported on a conversation he had with convicted sex offender
Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein reportedly told Stewart that he was advising
Elon Musk and
Tesla. Stewart was also told by Epstein that he had dirt on powerful people including personal details about their sexual activities and drug use.[9]
On July 31, 2019, Stewart along with
Matthew Goldstein and
Jessica Silver-Greenberg reported about Epstein's interest in
Eugenics and how he wished to seed the human race by using his own DNA. He also reportedly wanted his head and penis frozen.[10]
In October 2019, Stewart and Emily Flitter partnered on a piece which provided more detail as to Epstein's relationship with Microsoft founder
Bill Gates, which had started after Epstein had become a registered sex offender.[11]
Stewart, James (2023). Unscripted: The Epic Battle for a Media Empire and the Redstone Family Legacy.
Penguin Press.
ISBN978-1984879424. (with Rachel Abrams)
Stewart was inducted as a Laureate of
The Lincoln Academy of Illinois and awarded the Order of Lincoln (the State's highest honor) by the Governor of Illinois in 2002 in the area of Communications.[12]
In 1996 Stewart received an honorary doctorate from Quincy University.
Stewart has earned five
Gerald Loeb Awards: the 1987 Deadline and/or Beat Writing award for "Coverage of Wall Street Insider Trading Scandal",[4] the 1988 Large Newspapers award for "Terrible Tuesday",[13][14][15] the 2006 Business Book award for "DisneyWar",[16] the 2016 Commentary award for "Inside the Boardroom",[17] and the 2019 Feature award for "'If Bobbie Talks, I'm Finished': How Les Moonves Tried to Silence an Accuser".[18]
^Stewart, James B. (April 19, 2011). Tangled Webs: How False Statements Are Undermining America: From Martha Stewart to Bernie Madoff. Penguin Press.
ISBN978-1594202698.