[8] At the age of 16, his family moved to nearby Newark, New Jersey, after his mother remarried;[9] and he attended Saint Benedict's Preparatory School.

[14] He also hosts the Cape Up podcast, in which he talks to newsmakers about race, religion, age, gender, and cultural identity in politics.

Capehart replaced Mark Shields in the Friday political commentary segment on the PBS NewsHour starting in January 2021.

[22] Capehart has analyzed how, in concurrence with the work of Jonathan Metzl, white identity affects state-based policy making in the US, such as gun rights in Missouri and health care in Tennessee.

[23] In February 2016, Capehart published a false allegation about Senator Bernie Sanders, who was well known for his activism in civil rights causes.

[27] In May 2016, Capehart became engaged to his boyfriend of over five years, Nick Schmit, who was the assistant chief of protocol at the State Department.

[8] Capehart was a key contributor to a New York Daily News staff entry that received the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing in 1999.