This paper aims to explore the underlying ideologies as well as the relationship between news discourse and ideology by analyzing a news report on Saddam Hussein’s capture in New York Times from the perspective of critical discourse analysis. While making the analysis, this paper studies the details of linguistic features, transitivity, modality and thematic choice which are based on the three metafunctions of language proposed by Halliday in systemic-functional grammar, so as to reveal how news discourse is used by powerful groups to reinforce dominant ideologies, and to gain profound insights about the stance and attitude maintained in news reports. This paper aims to explore the underlying ideologies as well as the relationship between news discourse and ideology by analyzing a news report on Saddam Hussein’s capture in New York Times from the perspective of critical discourse analysis. While making the analysis, this paper studies the details of linguistic features, transitivity, modality and thematic choice which are based on the three metafunctions of language proposed by Halliday in systemic-functional grammar, so as to reveal how news discourse is used by powerful groups to reinforce dominant ideologies, and to gain profound insights about the stance and attitude maintained in news reports.