Krystal Ball

Krystal Marie Ball (born November 24, 1981)^[1] is an American businesswoman and certified public accountant. She was a co-host on the MSNBC's afternoon news/talk show The Cycle for the duration of the show's run from June 2012 to July 2015. She was also the Democratic Party nominee for United States Congress in Virginia's 1st congressional district in the 2010 election, losing to Republican Rob Wittman.

Life and career

Ball was born to Edward and Rose Marie Ball, a physicist and a teacher, respectively. The name Krystal came from her father, a physicist who did his dissertation on crystals.^[2]

Ball graduated from King George High School and received a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Virginia. She also attended Clemson University for a year where she participated on the swim team.^[3] She is a business owner and certified public accountant.^[4] Ball previously worked for the federal contractor CGI Group^[5] and traveled to Louisiana to assist in the courts' efforts to recover after Hurricane Katrina.

Ball is married to Jonathan Dariyanani, and they have a daughter named Ella Marie, born in 2008, and a son Lowell Maxwell born in 2013.^[5]

In 2012, Ball launched a website calling for a boycott of advertisers on the Rush Limbaugh Show after Limbaugh's comments about Sandra Fluke.^[6][7] The boycott attempted to get almost 100 advertisers to drop the show but eventually the boycott died out.^[8][9]

2010 U.S. Congressional campaign

In 2010 Ball ran to represent Virginia's 1st congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives and was defeated by Republican incumbent Rob Wittman. Despite being defeated by a margin of 63.90% to 34.76%,^[10] the former candidate was named by Forbes Magazine as number 21 on the magazine’s "The Top 25 Most Powerful Women Of The Midterm Elections".^[11]

Political positions

Ball supported:

• Education reform, including charter schools, using technology, alternative certification of teachers, and paying teachers six figure salaries.^[12]
• The 2nd Amendment as ensuring individual gun rights (she is an NRA member). Ball has stated that she is "uneasy" about guns in national parks.^[13]
• A lifetime ban on lobbying by former members of Congress, banning lobbyist gifts, increasing disclosure, and establishing a new Independent Ethics Commission to investigate and audit influence by special interests.^[13]

Of Ball's funding, 72 percent was from out of state donors.^[14]

Controversy

In October 2010, while in the final stages of her Congressional campaign, Ball received national attention when photos taken six years earlier emerged showing her at a holiday party dressed as a "naughty Santa" sucking a red dildo attached to her husband's nose and leading him around on a leash.^[15] The event quickly became a launching point for Ball, resulting in her being called upon by various news organizations for her inputs on the challenges faced by women in today's society and political environment.

Political commentator

Ball has made multiple appearances as a political commentator and Democratic strategist on television news channels, including Fox News Channel, CNN, CNBC, and is a contributor under contract for MSNBC.^[16][17] She is a regular contributor to the Huffington Post.^[18]

On June 25, 2012, Ball became one of four co-hosts on a new MSNBC show, The Cycle, with Touré, Steve Kornacki, and S.E. Cupp. It replaced the Dylan Ratigan show in 2012, where Ball had been a regular guest on a panel of political pundits.^[19] It was announced during the July 31, 2015 taping that The Cycle has been cancelled, as NBC revamped its weekday afternoon programming.

References

External links

• The Cycle on MSNBC
• Profile at Project Vote Smart
• Financial information (federal office) at the Federal Election Commission
• Campaign contributions at OpenSecrets.org
• Collected columns at The Atlantic