President Trump took a parting shot at MSNBC host Joy Reid after the cable network dumped the leftist firebrand’s show, but that wasn’t the end of the drama at NBCUniversal.
The Comcast-owned network said Monday that Lester Holt will step down after a decade as anchor of “NBC Nightly News” though he while continuing to host “Dateline,” the weekly newsmagazine show he has helmed for 15 years.
His replacement has not been named.
“A smile comes to my face when I think that with Nightly News, and Dateline, I have now anchored two of the most successful and iconic television news programs in broadcast history,” Mr. Holt told staffers in a memo. “As a 20-year-old radio reporter on the police beat chasing breaking news around San Francisco, I could never have imagined my career path would unfold in the way it has. What an amazing ride.”
The landing was not nearly as soft for Ms. Reid, known for her outspoken criticism of Mr. Trump, who reportedly learned Sunday that her show “The ReidOut” launched in 2020 has been dumped from the left-of-center cable network’s line-up.
Cheering her departure were conservatives and Republicans, led by the president himself.
He blasted Comcast Chairman and CEO Brian Roberts as well as Ms. Reid, declaring on Truth Social that Mr. Roberts “has finally gotten up the nerve to fire one of the least talented people in television, the mentally obnoxious racist, Joy Reid.”
“This whole corrupt operation is nothing more than an illegal arm of the Democrat Party,” Mr. Trump said late Sunday. “They should be forced to pay vast sums of money for the damage they’ve done to our Country. Fake News is an unpardonable sin!”
Curtis Houck, managing editor of the conservative Media Research Center’s NewsBusters, said that Ms. Reid “will go down as perhaps the single biggest source of racial venom in cable news history after Al Sharpton.”
SiriusXM host Megyn Kelly said on X: “Good riddance to the absolute worst person on television, and shame on NBC for letting it go on this long.”
Also losing her primetime gig was MSNBC host Alex Wagner. Her slot is slated to be taken by former Biden White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, host of “Inside with Jen Psaki,” according to Variety.
That’s not all. Shows by Ayman Mohyeldin, Katie Phang and Jonathan Capehart were axed Monday, according to the New York Post, as newly minted MSNBC President Rebecca Kutler takes charge of the struggling network.
Ms. Reid, who is expected to leave MSNBC, said in a video Monday that she was proud of her show and was “not sorry” that she spoke out in favor of Black Lives Matter, illegal immigrants, Palestinians in Gaza, and the 1619 Project.
The host cried in the video, which prompted much social-media mockery from conservatives.
“Joy Reid, who ridiculed white people for their tears, breaks down in tears over her show getting canceled,” OutKick founder Clay Travis wrote on X.
Those wishing her well included former Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison, who said on X he was “grateful for Joy Reid & her willingness to always provide a forum for voices and candidates often ignored by mainstream media.”
Ms. Reid’s primetime slot will be filled by the co-hosts of “The Weekend” — Symone Sanders-Townsend, Michael Steele and Alicia Menendez – whose show now runs Saturday and Sunday morning, CNN reported.
The upheaval comes as Comcast prepares to spin off MSNBC and other cable assets from NBCUniversal, creating a separate company tentatively entitled “SpinCo” that will include CNBC, USA Network, Oxygen, E!, SYFY, and the Golf Channel.
Ms. Kutler, who lost the “interim” tag on her title two weeks ago, has been credited with helping MSNBC’s ratings climb back after losing nearly half its audience as Democratic viewers tuned out following the November election.
Under Ms. Kutler, top-rated personality Rachel Maddow agreed to increase her once-a-week show to five days a week for the first 100 days of the Trump administration.
NBCUniversal and MSNBC settled a defamation lawsuit last week with Dr. Mahendra Amin, who sued over a 2020 story in which a whistleblower accused him of performing unwanted hysterectomies on illegal immigrants.
The allegations were repeated by MSNBC personalities Nicolle Wallace, Chris Hayes and Rachel Maddow, but a judge ruled last year that the story was false.
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.