- Both parents were immigrants. Father was Australian, mother was Cuban.
- Her mother, Estela Lucrecia (Marquetti y Mendieta), was a black high school teacher from Havana, Cuba, and her father, Edward Ephram O'Brien, was a white Australian, a mechanical engineer, who was of three quarters Irish and one quarter Scottish descent. Soledad has been honored by African-American, Hispanic-American, and Irish-American groups for her contributions to journalism. She studied at Smithtown High School East in St. James, N.Y., and went to Harvard, but dropped out at age 21 to become a newswriter and producer at Boston's WBZ-TV.
- Her name means "the Blessed Virgin Mary of Solitude" in Spanish.
- Friend of Spike Lee.
- Attended Radcliffe College from 1984 through 1988 with a pre-med major, before dropping out to take a job at WBZ-TV. She returned to college and graduated from Harvard University, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English and American Literature in 2000.
- Is the 5th of 6 children in the family of Estela Lucrecia (Marquetti y Mendieta) and Edward Ephram O'Brien, who were married from 1950 to her father's death in 2019. She has 3 older sisters, one older brother, and one younger brother: law professor Maria (born 1961), corporate lawyer Cecilia (born 1962), businessman Tony (born 1963), eye surgeon Estela (born 1964), and anesthesiologist Orestes (born 1967).
- Mother, with husband Brad Raymond, of four children: two daughters, Sofia Elizabeth Raymond (b. October 23, 2000) and Cecilia Raymond (b. March 20, 2002), and twin sons, Charles Raymond and Jackson Raymond (b. August 30, 2004).
- Voted one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in the World 2000 by People Magazine.
- She is a member of the National Association of Black Journalists and the National Association of Hispanic Journalists. O'Brien also serves on the board of directors for The Harlem School for the Arts.
- Her parents died 40 days apart in 2019.
- Aunt of Antonia Hylton.
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