Cesar Conde, a leader with an MBA but a limited journalism background, is facing the toughest scrutiny of his career.
Harry Smith is signing off from NBC News after 12 years. The beloved correspondent received an emotional sendoff during Friday’s Today show, where his colleagues got choked up sharing kind words about their time together.
Televised political combat existed in earlier times, like Shana Alexander and James Kilpatrick’s “point-counterpoint” segment on “60 Minutes” in the 1970s. Politics and journalism had its share of cross-fertilization with figures such as George Stephanopoulos and the late Tim Russert. Yet the idea of building rosters of paid political contributors took off with cable news. MSNBC, CNN and Fox News Channel are, in large part, political talk channels and seek experts to help fill the time. News streaming has similar needs. Being on call to opine can be lucrative work; several reports had NBC agreeing to pay McDaniel $300,000 a year.
By hiring and then quickly firing the former RNC chair, the organization managed to alienate nearly every constituency that matters. Insiders blame a byzantine structure and a lack of news chops at the top.
Exclusives
The former RNC chair is in talks with a prominent media talent lawyer about potential legal claims.
On Tuesday, NBC News fired former Republican National Committee chief Ronna McDaniel, less than a week after hiring her as an on-air political contributor, a decision that followed a furious protest by some of its journalists and commentators. In announcing the decision in a memo, NBC Universal News Group Chairman Cesar Conde apologized to staff members who felt let down by the hire, acknowledging he had signed off on it.
Former Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel has appeared only once on NBC News programming in her new capacity as a political news contributor, and already, senior executives are gathering to conduct a review. Top executives from NBC News were expected to meet Tuesday to hash out the growing controversy around her recent hire, according to two people familiar with the matter, in a bid to stop a growing insurrection by the NBCUniversal unit’s editorial staff.
For weeks before NBC News journalists exploded into open revolt Sunday over the network’s hire of a top Donald Trump supporter, the media company that controls three of the top U.S. news networks had been quietly rebuilding its ties to the former president.
The internal furor over NBC News’ decision to hire former Republican National Committee head Ronna McDaniel as a paid contributor spread Monday, with MSNBC personalities Rachel Maddow, Jen Psaki, Nicolle Wallace, Lawrence O’Donnell and Joe Scarborough all using their shows to publicly object. Maddow, MSNBC’s most popular personality, compared it to putting a mobster to work in a district attorney’s office.
Can a political-news contributor succeed after anchors at two prominent political-news program protest her hire? Ronna McDaniel was supposed to be the new star contributor at NBC News. Now her position there is looking increasingly untenable.
NEW YORK (AP) — The internal furor over NBC News’ decision to hire former Republican National Committee head Ronna McDaniel as a paid contributor spread Monday, with MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” […]
Former NBC News Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd criticized his network Sunday for hiring former Republican National Committee head Ronna McDaniel as a paid contributor, saying on the air that many NBC journalists are uncomfortable with the decision. Todd said many NBC journalists are uncomfortable with the hiring because some of their professional dealings with the RNC during McDaniel’s tenure “have been met with gaslighting, have been met with character assassination.”
Rashida Jones, the cable network’s president, seeks to address employee and talent backlash over the appointment of Ronna McDaniel as an NBC News contributor.
Over four decades, she rose to executive producer and helped secure interviews with presidents and other leaders in politics and the world of ideas.
Hallie Jackson, NBC News senior Washington correspondent, becomes anchor of the Sunday NBC Nightly News starting April 7. She will continue to anchor Hallie Jackson NOW weekdays at 5-7 p.m. ET on NBC News NOW. She will retain her Washington correspondent role too, reporting for Today, NBC Nightly News, Meet the Press and other NBC News properties.
A team of three NBC News reporters has won the 2024 Anthony Shadid Award for Journalism Ethics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison for their work exposing America’s failed death notification system. […]
Matt Glassman, WRC Washington news director, is joining NBC News as VP of regional editorial. It’s a new role and its focus is on driving reporting and expanded coverage between NBC News and NBCU Local’s NBC and Telemundo owned stations across the country.
NBC News Now — which is a free streaming service distributed across more than 20 platforms — serves as a seamless extension of NBC’s linear programming, and that linear-to-streaming symbiosis is believed to be the key to NBC News’ future. “The tradition of providing high-quality, free content is in the DNA of NBC and so it’s the future and the past, merged together,” says Janelle Rodriguez EVP of programming. “We’re using the same studios, control rooms, and are treating it like one big production.”
When the 32-year-old TV newsmagazine moved into podcasting, a few key assets helped it catapult beyond the tough competition.
Mike Calia has been named managing editor of NBC News’s Business & Economy unit. He comes from CNBC, where he was a senior editor at CNBC Digital. He will oversee editorial direction for the Business & Economy unit, with an emphasis on the state of the economy, the American consumer, the jobs market and what NBC News calls “pocketbook issues.” Calia spent close to seven years at CNBC.
NBC’s Vaughn Hillyard, who was representing a pool of five major TV networks, said the Trump campaign objected to his presence.
NBC News implemented a series of layoffs on Thursday, affecting several dozen staffers. The network currently has 150 new and open positions and the employees impacted by the layoffs have been encouraged to apply, according to a person familiar with the details.
NBC News announced Thursday that Dateline senior producer Paul Ryan will be the show’s new executive producer. He will oversee the brand’s broadcast, streaming and podcast entities.
The Iowa Caucus set to take place on Monday, Jan. 15, represents the first major presidential contest of the long election season, and NBC News is preparing for it with Closing Arguments: Iowa, a series of in-depth interviews with a trio of Republican presidential candidates.
This season to date, the broadcast news program has narrowed its viewership gap with ABC by 18%.
Once again, the popular newsmagazine show is top of its class, also coming in as No. 1 among true crime franchises, for the 2023 broadcast year-to-date. According to Nielsen’s most current data, the series has amassed more than 125 million viewers this year across broadcast, licensing and syndication. Nielsen’s most current data includes viewership tallies from Dec. 26, 2022, to Dec. 14, 2023. Across TV and digital platforms, viewers have consumed 162.5 billion minutes of Dateline, NBCU says.
