NBC Already Considering Terminating Ronna McDaniel After Backlash From Hosts
NBC News is already considering terminating the contract of former Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, a network insider tells Fox News Digital.
NBC host Chuck Todd and "Morning Joe" co-hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski criticized the hiring on NBC airwaves over the past two days.
"When NBC made the decision to give her NBC News’ credibility, you got to ask yourself, what does she bring NBC News?" Todd said, asking his network on "Meet the Press" to apologize for signing McDaniel.
Monday morning, Brzezinski requested NBC reconsider McDaniel's contract. Scarborough promised viewers McDaniel would not appear on his program, even if she remains employed.
But Scarborough doesn't need to warn his producers of his preferred edict. They already got the word – from the big boss.
The insider informed Fox News that MSNBC President Rashida Jones ensured colleagues over the weekend that McDaniel would not appear on MSNBC, the cable news arm of NBC News.
According to Fox News Digital, the internal pushback against McDaniel's hiring was "worse than leadership anticipated."
Spokespersons for NBC News and MSNBC didn't respond to a request for comment, adds the report.
The NBC News Guild also jabbed NBC for prioritizing an "election denier" after firing 13 union journalists. Specifically, NBC signed McDaniel for $300,000 a year, about the standard rate for a contributor of her status.
Earlier today, we contrasted the response from NBC hosts regarding the hiring of McDaniel to the many promotions of Democratic operatives inside NBC, most of whom the likes of Todd and Scarborough welcomed gleefully.
After all, former Biden press secretary Jen Psaki and former Kamala Harris staffer Symone Sanders-Townsend are two of the most-promoted newcomers on MSNBC.
We wrote:
"A credible news outlet calls out both sides for their cartoonish fallacies. A credible news outlet holds the voices of each side accountable.
"The faces of a credible news network do not bemoan the hiring of one Republican figure from Washington and welcome with open arms several Democratic operatives."
I tend to avoid sluggish clichés like "cancel culture," given the dilution of such terminology in our uber-politicized society,
Still, influential hosts at a major news network using their reach to pressure their bosses to fire a new employee over her contrasting political opinions is where I ought to make an exception.
NBC has the leverage. Todd and Scarborough are employees of its. And neither have the market to work elsewhere at the exorbitant salaries they do not.
The network executives, not the hosts, are in charge. But, based on the report, the executives there sound afraid. And thus willing to let the rank and file dictate terms.