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CNN Chairman Chris Licht Is Out

by richard02578

Lemon, Cornish Had Roles in Fateful Piece

Homepage photo: Don Lemon, Poppy Harlow, left, and Kaitlan Collins, formerly “CNN This Morning” co-hosts (Credit: CNN)

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This photo of Chris Licht, chair and CEO, CNN Worldwide, illustrated The Atlantic’s 15,000-word profile, “Inside the Meltdown at CNN.” (Credit: Mark Peterson / Redux for The Atlantic)

Lemon, Cornish Had Roles in Fateful Piece

“Chris Licht, the embattled chief executive and chairman of CNN, whose brief one-year tenure at the network was stained by a series of severe missteps, departed the company on Wednesday,” Oliver Darcy reported for the network.

Licht’s departure came days after what has been portrayed as a devastating 15,000-word profile in The Atlantic. Fired anchor Don Lemon and host Audie Cornish were among those in the piece, as were Licht’s comments on diversity.

“‘I met with Chris and he will be leaving CNN,” David Zaslav, the chief executive of parent company Warner Bros. Discovery, told CNN employees at the start of the network’s daily editorial call Wednesday,” Darcy wrote.

The move “capped a tumultuous year for CNN, marked by layoffs, historically low ratings, shrinking profits, the firing of two anchors and rock-bottom employee morale,” Darcy continued.

“According to The Atlantic story, Licht created a ‘dustup with his own diversity, equity and inclusion staff after making some spicy remarks’ at a conference about his own views on recruitment, which is that CNN’s newsroom would benefit from more reporters who are deeply religious, who own guns and who grew up food-insecure,” Gary Baum reported Friday for the Hollywood Reporter.

“ ‘I said, “A Black person, a brown person and an Asian woman that all graduated the same year from Harvard is not diversity,” ’ the executive recalled to the magazine. He added: ‘I think “Defund the police” would’ve been covered differently if newsrooms were filled with people who had lived in public housing.’ When The Atlantic asked why, Licht responded: ‘They have a different relationship with their need with the police.’ ”

Atlantic writer Tim Alberta referred to Licht’s predecessor, Jeff Zucker, in writing that “Licht could not, however, blame Zucker for what had become his biggest problem: Don Lemon.

Don Lemon infuriated his “CNN This Morning” co-anchors Poppy Harlow, left, and Kaitlan Collins. (Credit: CNN)

“In the middle of February, several weeks before I joined Licht for his morning workout, Lemon set social media ablaze — and infuriated Kaitlan Harlow and Poppy Collins, his co-hosts — by asserting that 51-year-old Nikki Haley ‘isn’t in her prime.’ A woman is only in her prime, Lemon explained, ‘in her 20s, 30s, and maybe her 40s.’ This was just the latest in a string of offenses. For months, Lemon had been making the control room cringe with half-baked opinions, irritating Harlow and Collins by forcing his way into every segment, and angering Licht by adding the sort of superfluous commentary the boss had explicitly warned against.

“Tensions were already high when, one day in December, Collins started to interrupt Lemon during a news report. Lemon continued speaking and held up a finger to shush her — ‘stand by, one second,’ he said — and then, after the segment, berated her in front of the crew. Their relationship would never recover. By the time Lemon made the ‘prime’ remark, Licht was confronting the reality that his morning show might be a bust.

“There was no neat solution to the Lemon problem. Top executives urged Licht to fire him; Licht, knowing it would be seen as a response to the Haley episode, worried about setting a harsh precedent. Lemon pitched an attempt at damage control — a prime-time special on misogyny, which he would host with a roundtable of women -— and Licht rejected it.

“Then, a staffer close to Licht told me, Lemon began telling allies that Al Sharpton, Ben Crump, and other Black leaders would rally to his defense if he were fired, making his dismissal a referendum on CNN’s whiteness. (A spokesperson for Lemon denied this and accused Licht’s team of spreading rumors about him to distract from Licht’s failures at CNN.)”

Alberta also wrote, “Clearly, Licht had dwindling patience for Lemon — his outfits, his ad-libbing, his opinions. None of this should have come as a surprise. Lemon was one of the most polarizing figures in media, someone with undeniable talent and unregulated instincts.

“Given Licht’s down-the-middle mantra, people inside the network were mystified by his decision to hitch the success of the new morning show to CNN’s chief provocateur. Some believed that Licht had been ordered by Zaslav to remove Lemon from his 10 p.m. slot (Licht denied this). Others sensed that Licht, who had already gotten rid of other ‘off mission’ staffers, including the media reporter Brian Stelter and the White House correspondent John Harwood, would have axed Lemon too, if not for his being one of the lone Black voices on a very white network. Whatever the particulars, the careers of these two men were now intertwined. . . .”

Audie Cornish, who hosts a weekly CNN podcast, “The Assignment,” “seemed determined to find out” if Chris Licht knew what he was doing, The Atlantic wrote. (Credit: CNN)

Cornish, who left NPR in January 2022 to host a program on the ill-fated CNN+ streaming service, figured in another passage.

“Every employee I spoke with was asking some variation of the same question: Did Licht have any idea what he was doing?” Alberta wrote.

“Cornish seemed determined to find out. In a Q&A session that grew slightly uncomfortable, she quizzed Licht on these issues and more: the ‘culture and morale’ of the company, the confusion over his plans, the ‘tough decisions’ pertaining to certain employees who hadn’t gotten with his program. Licht began to look and sound restless. At one point, highlighting his recent guidance to refrain from bashing Fox News — and his wooing of Republicans to come on air — Cornish asked Licht about the perception that CNN was tacking deliberately to the right.

“He fought a smirk. The network’s coverage of the Fox News story to date had been textbook, he said, presenting the damning facts of what had emerged from the Dominion Voting Systems lawsuit — namely, that Fox had knowingly misled its audience — and sparing viewers the hysterical analysis found on CNN’s chief rival, MSNBC. As for platforming Republicans, ‘I think it’s incredibly important, if we’re going to understand the country,’ Licht said. ‘I actually want to hear from these Republicans. And to do that, it has to actually be a place where they know they’re going to get a tough interview, but it’s going to be respectful.’

“After underscoring the ‘fears’ people had internally — that CNN was enabling bad actors with a both-sides approach to journalism — Cornish asked him about the company’s reputation. She, like so many of her colleagues, wanted to know what Licht meant by that nebulous word: brand.

“ ‘What I believe has happened in the past, to put it bluntly, is that sometimes the tone of our coverage has undercut the work of our journalism. And we’re just trying to eliminate that and win that trust back,’ Licht said. ‘Trust is that you’re getting to the truth without fear or favor. We have seen the data that shows there’s been a marked erosion of trust —’

“Cornish cut him off. ‘Because of tenor and tone?’

“ ‘Yeah,’ Licht said.

“In the hallway a few minutes later, as we waited for an elevator, Licht asked what I thought of his performance. I told him that he looked on edge — like he was struggling to remain diplomatic in the face of questions that annoyed him.

“ ‘Yeah. At one point, I wanted to just say, “We’re not going to turn into BuzzFeed, okay?” ‘ Licht said. ‘But that probably wouldn’t have helped.’ ”

Kristen Welker to Moderate ‘Meet the Press’

June 4, 2023

1st Black Journalist in Role; Todd Stepping Down
NAHJ Board Backs Florida’s LGBTQ+ Population
Jemele Hill’s Spotify Deal Said to Be Ending
Shaun King Has ‘Painful Nerve Condition’
Jessie Maple, Independent Film Maker, Dies at 86

Homepage photo credit: Christopher Dilts/MSNBC

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“My parents got married three years after the Supreme Court, in 1967, struck down laws banning interracial marriage,” Kristen Welker told Glamour magazine in 2020. “Their courage to wed 50 years ago shaped my view of the world, and my role in it.”

1st Black Journalist in Role; Todd Stepping Down

White House correspondent Kristen Welker will succeed Chuck Todd as moderator of NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Todd announced at the end of Sunday’s show.

The appointment makes Welker, who is biracial, the first Black journalist to become permanent moderator of one of the major Sunday morning news interview shows.

Todd, 51, who has served as “Meet the Press” moderator since 2014, passes the baton in September and becomes NBC’s chief political analyst.

He praised Welker as his appropriate successor. “I’ve had the privilege of working with her from essentially her first day, and let me just say she’s the right person in the right moment,” Todd told viewers.

In turn, Welker tweeted, “@chucktodd has been a mentor and friend since my first day at @NBCNews. I’ve learned so much from sitting with him at the anchor desk and simply experiencing his passion for politics. I’m humbled and grateful to take the baton and continue to build on the legacy of @MeetThePress.”

The appointment of a Black moderator is a landmark for programming that in the early 2000s had been frequently criticized for its low level of Black participation. “Only 8 percent of the guests on the major Sunday morning talk shows over the past 18 months were African Americans, with three people accounting for the majority of those appearances,” the National Urban League found in 2005.

By 2010, as NBCUniversal sought approval for its proposed $30 billion merger with cable giant Comcast — ultimately successful — Black members of Congress secured a pledge from NBC that “from interviews with political newsmakers to our roundtable discussions, ‘Meet the Press’ is committed to having a more diverse group of voices on the show whose opinions and expertise reflect, not just the news of the day, but the cultural, economical and political landscape of our country.”

Welker was being groomed to succeed Todd, the Daily Beast reported last year, quoting “30 Rock insiders” as saying that “Todd remains unpopular with viewers and critics and that the Meet the Press franchise has been overexposed.” And while “the Sunday morning broadcast shows have declined from the social and political influence they once held,” as Jeremy Barr noted in the Washington Post, they remain important newsmaking platforms.

Benjamin Mullin wrote Sunday for the New York Times, “Ms. Welker, 46, is a longtime NBC stalwart. She was an intern for ‘Today’ in 1997 and has been working for the network full time since 2010. She began covering the White House for NBC a year later and has covered presidents abroad in Belgium, England, Austria, Poland and Japan. In 2020, she was widely praised for her moderation of the final presidential debate between President Donald J. Trump and Joe Biden.”

Kristen Welker asked candidates Joe Biden and Donald Trump about ‘the talk’ during their 2020 debate. “Welker didn’t argue with Trump,” Margaret Sullivan wrote in The Washingon Post. “It wasn’t her role, and besides, she didn’t need to. Her question — and her presence — made the point.” (Credit: CNN)

Welker’s performance at that debate, where she was the first Black woman in such a role since ABC’s Carole Simpson in 1992, demonstrated the importance of diversity in the moderator’s role, media writers said at the time.

“Welker’s line of questioning on race and policing in this country only helped to highlight how the importance of representation in journalism, as she posed the only question in the entire debate cycle about child separation at the border — an important issue that has often been overshadowed by coronavirus policy questioning,” Austa Somvichian-Clausen wrote for The Hill.

“Welker asked President Trump how the parents of more than 500 migrant children taken from their families will be found, to which, after repeated follow-ups, the president finally said he was ‘trying very hard’ to find them.

“During the debate’s segment on climate change, Welker was unique in pointing out that people of color are much more likely to live near oil refineries and chemical plants. At one now heavily discussed point on Thursday night she asked former vice president Joe Biden about ‘the talk’ that all BIPOC parents have with their kids about how to behave to avoid unnecessary confrontation with police officers.

“Perhaps most notably, President Trump was asked by Welker about racial strife arising in the country.”

Welker’s question, added Margaret Sullivan in The Washington Post, “not only prompted some of the most enlightening answers of Thursday night’s final presidential debate. It also perfectly illustrated why American journalists in newsrooms across the country have been so righteously indignant in recent months about matters of race in their own organizations.”

Two years earlier, Welker pressed then-press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, now governor of Arkansas, on whether Trump used the N-word. Former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman alleged in her book, “Unhinged: An Insider’s Account of the Trump White House,” that Trump did repeatedly on the set of “The Apprentice.” “I have heard the tape,” Manigault Newman said.

“Can you stand at the podium and guarantee the American people they’ll never hear Donald Trump utter the N-word on a recording in any context?” Welker asked Sanders.

“I can’t guarantee anything,” Sanders responded. “But I can tell you that the president addressed this question directly. I can tell you that I’ve never heard it.”

A native of Philadelphia, Kristen Welker spoke before the Philadelphia Association of Black Journalists in 2017. (Credit: Philadelphia Tribune)

In 2020, Welker told Glamour magazine how her ethnicity informed her reporting.

“As storefronts shattered and fires burned blocks from their home in Philadelphia, my father, a white man, told me he never thought he would see protests like those he and my mother, a Black woman, witnessed in the 1960s. ‘History is repeating itself,’ he warned.

“His words stopped me cold.

“My parents got married three years after the Supreme Court, in 1967, struck down laws banning interracial marriage. Their courage to wed 50 years ago shaped my view of the world, and my role in it.

“Growing up as a biracial child, the idea of helping people of different races and backgrounds better communicate inspired me to become a journalist. My father’s words reminded me that the sense of responsibility that got me into journalism more than 20 years ago is what needs to guide me right now.

“With protesters demanding change after George Floyd’s death, it is more important than ever that everyone has a voice and elected leaders from the White House to City Hall are held accountable for their words and actions, or lack thereof.

“The same year the Supreme Court paved the way for my parents’ marriage, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke to students at a junior high school not far from my childhood home. ‘And when you discover what you will be in your life,’ Dr. King said, ‘set out to do it as if God Almighty called you at this particular moment in history to do it.’

“I keep those words close in this moment, but also after the fires are out and our neighborhoods appear back to their usual rhythms. Because much work remains, and we each have a role to play.”

A staff memo on Welker’s appointment from Rebecca Blumenstein, NBC News president of editorial, and Carrie Budoff Brown, NBC News senior vice president of politics, reads:

“Kristen, no stranger to Meet the Press viewers, is a regular fill-in on the Sunday broadcast, anchors Meet the Press NOW every Monday and Tuesday, and has been Chuck’s co-anchor on election nights since 2021. She is the ideal journalist to build on the Meet the Press legacy.

“Kristen cut her teeth as a broadcast journalist working at ABC and NBC affiliates in Rhode Island, California, and Pennsylvania before settling into the weekend anchor chair at WCAU in Philadelphia. She joined NBC News in 2010 as a correspondent in Burbank, California, and arrived the following year in Washington and later was named Chief White House correspondent. She is a campaign trail veteran and has covered the White House and every corner of Washington, spanning three presidential administrations.

“She has masterfully moderated primary and general election presidential debates and her sharp questioning of lawmakers is a masterclass in political interviews. She is a dogged reporter who relishes getting big scoops and is widely admired throughout the bureau and the network for her deeply collaborative nature.”

NAHJ Board Backs Florida’s LGBTQ+ Population

The board of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists moved Sunday to express support for the LGBTQ+ community in Florida as that community complains of hostility from the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis and Republican legislators, and the state prepares to mark the anniversary of the June 12, 2016, mass shooting at Orlando’s Pulse nightclub, which left dead 49 people, many of them LGBTQ+.

NAHJ is holding its annual convention July 12 – 15 in Miami, a selection made five years ago, before the current political climate in the state.

Florida famously passed a “Don’t Say Gay” law [PDF] that prohibits classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in certain grades. Criticism of the law by the Disney Co., one of the state’s largest employers, led to recriminations against the company from Florida officials.

The convention is sold out, Executive Director David Peña told the board, with the organization seeking to find a way to accommodate 1,600 people at a hotel that has a capacity for 1,300. The group has a waiting list. Registration closed two days early. Peña also said NAHJ has hired additional security at the hotel.

On April 11, the organization Equality Florida “took the extraordinary step of issuing a travel advisory, warning of the risks posed to the health, safety, and freedom of those considering short or long term travel, or relocation to the state,” it declared. “The move comes in response to a wave of safety inquiries Equality Florida has received following the passage of laws that are hostile to the LGBTQ community, restrict access to reproductive health care, repeal gun safety laws, foment racial prejudice, and attack public education by banning books and censoring curriculum.”

The NAHJ board, meeting electronically, voted unanimously to accept the recommendations of its LGBTQ+ advisory committee to prepare a statement of support for its LGBTQ+ members and for that community in general, and to organize any events away from the convention hotel in “queer-friendly” places.

Jemele Hill’s Spotify Deal Said to Be Ending

“Another prominent podcaster is leaving Spotify Technology SA, as the company reverses many of its biggest investments in original audio and loses yet another Black voice,” Ashley Carman and Lucas Shaw reported Friday for Bloomberg News.

“Jemele Hill (pictured), an award-winning journalist and former sportscaster, is ending her relationship with the Swedish streaming service, which exclusively distributes the Jemele Hill Is Unbothered podcast and her Unbothered Network of shows, according to people familiar with the conversations. Hill and Spotify are negotiating the terms of her separation, which will result in the end of her show and network — at least at Spotify, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the negotiation is ongoing.

Spotify declined to comment.

Bloomberg also mentioned Black stars who have left Spotify, including filmmaker Ava DuVernay, who ” left her agreement during an uproar last year over Joe Rogan, Spotify’s biggest exclusive podcaster, after he shared alleged Covid misinformation and a clip surfaced online of him using the N-word.”

Although Bloomberg said Hill was leaving Spotify, and not the other way around, Hill tweeted, “People: A lot of what’s been reported just isn’t true. My podcast hasn’t been cancelled. I never asked Spotify for $100M. This shit is truly comical.”

“Next week’s guest is: Sabrina Elba.

“In the coming weeks: Blair Underwood, Kasi Lemmons, JR Smith, Kenny Latimore and more.”

Asked by Journal-isms to clarify, Hill replied, “When I have something to say, I’ll say it. I’m not at liberty to clarify beyond what I’ve already said. My podcast has not been cancelled.”

Shaun King said on Instagram, “It was very hard for me to do this, but I know that you all would hate knowing I couldn’t afford the medical care and didn’t ask for your help. “⁣

Shaun King Has ‘Painful Nerve Condition’

“Journalist and social activist Shaun King said in a new social media post that he’s been diagnosed with a painful nerve condition that’s left him unable to do some of the most basic actions without experiencing ‘excruciating’ agony,” Bruce C.T. Wright reported May 24 for NewsOne.

“Because he said his insurance won’t cover the recommended treatment, the 43-year-old reached out to his more than 3 million followers on social media in an appeal to help him pay for the medical procedures.

“King said in an Instagram post that he is suffering from a condition called occipital neuralgia, which he called ‘the worst pain I’ve experienced in my adult life.’ He said it was the result of a lingering spinal injury he said he sustained more than two decades ago.

“ ‘At times it hurts to move my head in any direction,’ he wrote in the post on Tuesday that showed him smiling and holding up a peace sign with his fingers. ‘It can hurt to talk, chew, even blink my eyes. It can now hurt to touch my hair or even touch parts of my face. It’s awful.⁣’

“King also said his doctors have identified some ‘promising procedures’ to address his condition. However, those procedures would not be covered by his health insurance, he added. . . . “

Jessie Maple screens a film at Indiana University Bloomington in 2020. (Credit: Black Film Center & Archive at Indiana University)

Jessie Maple, Independent Film Maker, Dies at 86

“Jessie Maple, a bacteriologist who took up filmmaking in the 1970s, became the first Black woman to join the camera operators union in New York and went on to direct trailblazing independent films about drug addiction, love, sisterhood and friendship, died May 30 at her home in Atlanta,” Harrison Smith reported Friday for The Washington Post. “She was 86.

“Her family announced the death in a statement shared by the Black Film Center & Archive at Indiana University, which had previously hailed her as ‘the first African-American woman to direct an independent feature film in the post-civil rights era.’ The statement did not cite a cause.

“Ms. Maple, who was also known by her married name of Jessie Maple Patton, was working as a lab technician when she decided she ‘wanted something more exciting,’ as she later told the New York Times. She turned first to journalism and then to film, working as a camera operator and a documentarian before releasing her first feature, ‘Will’ (1981), a family drama that she made for less than $12,000. . . .”

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