

Licht, Pope says, is trying to thread two opposing camps as many US newsroom are trying to do.
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On the other, that democracy and a free press is under existential threat, and coverage has to be more muscular and forceful.

On one side is the view that this is politics and it should be covered aggressively. That split comes down a split over the fears for democracy in America. “CNN is one example of a bigger battle that’s going to come to a head in the coverage of the midterms and immediately after.” CNN is one example of a bigger battle that’s going to come to a head in the coverage of the midterms and immediately after Kyle Pope
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“There is a huge split within journalism and within newsrooms about how to respond to this moment,” said Kyle Pope, editor and publisher of Columbia Journalism Review. The threat to American democracy by a resurgent Republican party – which could have Trump again vying for the White House in 2024 – has not gone away.

“At a time where extremes are dominating cable news, we will seek to go a different way, reflecting the real lives of our viewers and elevating the way America and the world views this medium,” Licht told advertisers last month.ĬNN’s attempt to reach an audience lying somewhere in a mythological political center may not be easy to manage. Boosting CNN’s revenues is a priority for new owner Warner Bros Discovery that’s carrying about $59bn in debt and promised shareholders $3bn in cost savings. Fox News, by contrast, had revenues of $12.3bn off a far larger audience. John Malone, a major shareholder in CNN’s new owner, Warners Bros Discovery, said that he “would like to see CNN evolve back to the kind of journalism that it started with, and actually have journalists”.Ĭable news depends heavily on cable providers as much as 60% of CNN’s $1.8bn in revenue last year came from the carriers. The effort to turn CNN away from being the story (Donald Trump memorably christened it “Fake News Network” Anderson Cooper called him “an obese turtle on his back flailing in the hot sun”) to reporting it, comes amid pressure from cable-TV distributors to drop politically contentious cable channels.Įarlier this year, DirecTV, one of the largest US pay-TV providers, announced it would drop One America News Network, the conservative channel criticized for spreading misinformation. The moves, both editorial and commercial, come months after a sex-and-politics scandal at the network that saw the departure of CEO Jeff Zucker who had been having an affair with the marketing chief, Allison Gollust, who had previously worked for former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, whose brother and CNN anchor Chris Cuomo had helped fashion the governor’s response to sex harassment claims. Licht was the producer of that show before he later went on to produce The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. It’s an innovation, the outlet said, that comes from a montage of headlines called the “ Eye Opener” on CBS This Morning. On Friday, Bloomberg reported that Licht was considering seeking brands to sponsor segments on CNN shows.

There is a huge split within journalism and within newsrooms about how to respond to this moment Kyle Pope Set against a post-Trump identity crisis and a slump in viewers – CNN averages 178,000 viewers in the key 25-to-54 demographic, down 63% from a year ago – the reformist spirit comes as the network’s net advertising revenue fell 2% last year due to lower ratings, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence’s Kagan. He is said to prefer the more specific “Trump’s lie” or “lies about the election”. The tenor of our voice holistically has to reflect that,” Licht added.Īmong the reforms, Licht directed network anchors and producers to stop using the phrase “The Big Lie” to describe attempts to overturn the result of the 2020 election – in part because it’s a Democratic party catchphrase. “You’ve already seen far less of the ‘Breaking News’ banner across our programming. “We are truth-tellers, focused on informing, not alarming our viewers,” newly installed Licht wrote in a memo to employees this month, saying there “needs to be room for nuance”. According to a swath of US media reports, CNN has entered high gear in a reformist effort to phase out overt political partisanship, reduce the frequency of “breaking news” alerts, dissuade non-primetime anchors from airing their views, and broadly to avoid presenting the extremes of political thought of either side, left or right.
