Terry Moran was born on December 9, 1959, in Chicago, Illinois, and grew up in Mount Prospect and Barrington Hills, Illinois. He attended Lawrence University, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English in 1982. While in college, he edited the school newspaper, The Lawrentian, and was awarded a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship upon graduation.

Moran began his broadcasting career at Court TV, where he earned critical acclaim for covering the O.J. Simpson and the Menendez brothers trials, before joining ABC News in 1997. He rapidly rose through the ranks, becoming Chief White House Correspondent in 2000 — covering the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, the 9/11 attacks, and the Iraq War. In 2004, he became the anchor of World News Tonight Sunday and later served as co-anchor of Nightline from 2005 to 2013.

After Nightline, he served as ABC’s Chief Foreign Correspondent based in London from 2013 to 2018, before returning to Washington as Senior National Correspondent. In April 2025, he conducted an exclusive Oval Office interview with President Trump, marking the president’s first 100 days of his second term. He was fired by ABC  weeks later over a tweet about the president.