MS Now, the liberal cable information community known until last November as MSNBC, on Wednesday introduced its first vital programming modifications since being spun off as a part of a brand new media firm referred to as Versant.
The community introduced that Morning Joe, its flagship breakfast program, will shift again from being 4 hours to a few hours, as Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough, married co-hosts, have talked concerning the pressure of internet hosting a four-hour-long present daily.
Taking a kind of hours might be a brand new two-hour-long morning present from 9 to 11am hosted by Stephanie Ruhle, the longtime MS Now anchor who presently hosts a present at 11pm. The late-night present will now be hosted by Ali Velshi, whose weekend present might be taken over by Jacob Soboroff.
Ana Cabrera, who anchored a 10am information present for MS Now, will depart the community as a part of the modifications, which go into impact in June.
There may also be a brand new co-host of the community’s 7pm present the Weeknight, which changed Joy Reid’s program. Luke Russert, the son of legendary Meet the Press moderator, Tim Russert, will now co-host the present together with Symone Sanders Townsend and Michael Steele. Alicia Menendez, who’s presently a part of the internet hosting trio, will get her personal present from 12 to 2pm daily. (The community’s present 12pm anchor, Chris Jansing, will swap to a reporting position.)
Chris Hayes, the MS Now host, may also return to internet hosting his 8pm present 5 days per week, reasonably than 4.
Rebecca Kutler, the president of MS Now, tied the modifications to the upcoming midterm elections and the 2028 presidential election.
Many staffers who work on the affected exhibits will have the ability to transfer into new roles on the firm, she mentioned in a memo to workers. She mentioned the corporate’s total employees depend would develop by the tip of the yr.
“I am confident that these changes will make what is already a successful lineup even stronger in the future,” she wrote within the memo. “We are fortunate to have so many exceptional journalists on our air, online and behind the scenes.”
MS Now’s mother or father firm, Versant, which additionally consists of networks like CNBC and the Golf Channel, reported earnings for the first time earlier this month, asserting that its complete income for 2025, $6.69bn, would have are available in 5.3% decrease than the earlier yr.
But Versant chief government, Mark Lazarus, mentioned that MSNBC had achieved vital development in viewership since the name change in November. In February, the community averaged 1.4 million complete viewers in primetime, up 20% from the earlier yr, the corporate mentioned.
Still, the community’s rankings have been weakest throughout the daytime, which the modifications introduced Wednesday are supposed to deal with.
In a put up on X, Cabrera mentioned she “decided to make a change” by leaving the community and can share extra details about her future plans quickly. “My goal has always been to educate and inform and shine light, to hold people in power accountable, people on all sides of the political aisle and non-politicians as well, to be a government watchdog, to bring you compelling stories from across a broad range of news and to always seek the truth, following the facts wherever they lead,” she wrote. “That’s what I’ve always done, and what I will continue to do.”
(The media publication Status first reported many of those deliberate modifications.)
