Rafael Pineda

Who is Rafael Pineda?

Rafael Pineda is a retired Cuban-American television news reporter and anchor for the Spanish language station WXTV, the Univision affiliate in New York City.

Born in 1938 in Cuba, he later immigrated to the United States as an adult. In the position since 1971, Pineda surpassed Bill Beutel of WABC-TV as the longest-serving anchor in New York television history.

For more than forty years, Pineda was the lead news anchor on WXTV. In 1988, he became host of the first Spanish-language local interview program in the tri-state area, Punto y Aparte until it ended a year later, in 1989. He led Noticias 41 Nueva York to first place among New York's Spanish language newscasts and was the first Spanish-speaking news anchor to interview both political figures and celebrities, such as Bill Clinton and Desi Arnaz.