Maggie Rodriguez Joins "The Early Show"

Maggie Rodriguez will join Harry Smith and Julie Chen as co-anchor of The Early Show.

"This is my dream job," Rodriguez said. "I get to utilize the journalistic skills I've developed over the past 15 years and have fun at the same time with feature segments. To do that with a group of people I like and respect as much as The Early Show team, who've made me feel welcome from day one, is wonderful."

She had been a co-anchor of The Saturday Early Show since June 2007 and her new position begins Monday, Jan. 7, 2008.

"In the past six months, Maggie has proved to be a remarkably good fit in morning news," President of CBS News Sean McManus said. "Not only has she done great work on the morning broadcasts, both weekend and weekday, but she also has reported for the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric and anchored the weekend Evening News. Her tenacity as a journalist and her authenticity and warmth will serve Maggie and CBS News very well. As we look to the future - including our switch to a full national format on Jan. 7 - I'm pleased that she, Harry, Julie, Russ and Dave will be in charge of the 'morning shift' at CBS News."

Before joining CBS News, Rodriguez, a Miami native, anchored the 5 p.m. and 11 p.m. newscasts at WFOR-TV, the CBS affiliate in Miami, for seven years. From 1994 to 2000, she was anchor of the midday news and of a weekend magazine show at KABC-TV Los Angeles and has also worked for Univision.

"Maggie is a terrific addition to The Early Show with so much experience in live anchoring," said Shelley Ross, Senior Executive Producer of the broadcast. "In the time she's been working with our Early Show team, we've come to both respect her as a journalist and really enjoy her as a colleague."