Ressa, Maria (1963-…), is a Filipino and American journalist and co-founder of the Philippine online news site Rappler. Ressa has gained a reputation for exposing abuse of power, the use of propaganda and fake news in the media, and government violence. For her work, Ressa shared the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize with the Russian journalist Dmitri Muratov, becoming the first Filipino to win the award. 
Maria Angelita Aycardo was born on Oct. 2, 1963, in Manila, Philippines. Her father died when she was an infant, and her mother immigrated to the United States to find work. Aycardo lived with her sister and grandparents in Manila, attending St. Scholastica’s College, a Roman Catholic school, until third grade. When President Ferdinand Edralin Marcos declared martial law in 1972, her mother returned for her and her sister, bringing them to Toms River, New Jersey. Martial law is a temporary, emergency form of government under military rule. Aycardo took the last name of her Italian American stepfather in 1973, becoming Maria Ressa. Ressa graduated from Toms River High School North in 1982, having served as class president for three years.
Ressa enrolled at Princeton University in New Jersey. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English in 1986. Ressa earned a Fulbright Scholarship in 1986 to study political drama in the Philippines. She remained in the Philippines, working for People’s Television 4, a former government-run television network, and Cable News Network (CNN). Ressa started an investigative news production company, Probe Productions Inc. She continued working for CNN, leading the Manila bureau of the network. Ressa moved to Jakarta, Indonesia, in 1995 to serve as CNN’s chief investigative reporter in Asia. In 2005, Ressa became a broadcaster for ABS-CBN News, a Philippine media company, and later served as senior vice president for news and public affairs. Ressa left ABS-CBN in 2011 to found Rappler. The website went live on Jan. 1, 2012.
In 2015, Ressa interviewed Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte, who was elected president of the Philippines the following year. Rappler, under Ressa’s leadership, became one of the only media organizations to openly question Duterte’s government. Rappler criticized the administration’s war on drugs and use of propaganda, which were also condemned by many governments and international human rights organizations. Duterte banned Rappler reporters and revoked the website’s license. In 2020, a Manila court convicted Ressa and a former colleague of cyber-libel. Cyber-libel is the posting of statements on the internet that harm a person’s reputation.
Ressa has earned many international awards and nominations for her journalism. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work in protecting freedom of expression. The Philippine government attempted to block Ressa from attending the awards ceremony in Oslo, Norway, stating that it presented her with the opportunity to flee sentencing. A Philippine Court of Appeals ruled that Ressa was allowed to attend the awards ceremony.
Ressa wrote Seeds of Terror: An Eyewitness Account of Al-Qaeda’s Newest Center (2003) and From Bin Laden to Facebook: 10 Days of Abduction, 10 Years of Terrorism (2013). She wrote How to Stand up to a Dictator (2022).
