No matter how bad a weekend you may have had (and, FWIW, mine sucked) you likely didn’t have one half as bad as the one that Joy Reid and her team had. THE INDEPENDENT’s Katie Hawkinson was among the many whose own weekend was disrupted to report what happened to them:
MSNBC has canceled Joy Reid’s evening news show and held a “tense” meeting with her staff after the news was leaked to the press.
The final episode ofThe ReidOut will air this week, The New York Times reports. Her slot will be replaced by a show led by a trio of hosts: Democratic strategist Symone Sanders Townsend, former Republican National Committee chair Michael Steele and journalist Alicia Menendez. They currently host The Weekend, which airs on Saturday and Sunday mornings.
Rebecca Kutler, the network’s newly-appointed leader, made the call amid larger plans to overhaul MSNBC’s programming, according to the Times. Now, media journalist Oliver Darcy reports Reid’s staff found out they were losing their jobs in a tense and emotional 30-minute impromptu meeting Sunday morning. Staffers were reportedly frustrated they learned about the show shutting down from media reports, rather than directly from leadership.
Well it’s not like the writing hasn’t been on the wall for quite a while. Even we mused about exactly how bad things had been going for Reid roughly two months ago. In that piece we noted one particularly incideniary observation:
In a series of tweets, Jon Nicosia, head of the yet to launch News Cycle Media, reports a Comcast source saying that MSNBC’s “The ReidOut,” hosted by left leaning Joy Reid, will be canceled by mid-spring — a claim MSNBC denies.
“It’s bogus,” said an MSNBC spokesperson when contacted by MixDex about Nicosia’s tweets.
“As was the case with Chris Cuomo at CNN, Reid has allies at Comcast, however, she is now viewed as ‘unmanageable’ by many. Also, similar to Cuomo, it appears those allies have found out she has been ‘less than truthful about past incidents’,” Nicosia tweeted.
He also claims that his source says that Comcast has made its decision already, but internal work is being done on how to handle the messaging of the cancellation, which will be blamed on ratings.
Well, as it turned out, Nicosia’s reporting did turn out to be bogus. MSNBC didn’t even wait for spring.
But, then again, it’s not like Reid even made the slightest bit of an effort to broaden the narrowing pulpit that she maintained a grip on despite consistently third-place and demographically horrid audience deliveries as the lead-off to what the network considers to be prime time. In a week where Janet Mills took the bold step of standing up for her state of Maine and defiantly stood up to the guy who apparently grinds Reid’s gears to no end, somehow her story wasn’t one her staffers felt was significant enough to warrant coverage, let alone an interview. You don’t suppose that might have had something to do with the fact that Maine’s proportion of African Americans is a mere 1.59 percent–or just over 10 per cent of the overall U.S. proportion?
Indeed, Reid has continued to rely upon her usual cadre of like-minded regulars such as Al Sharpton, Jazmin Crockett and Elie Mystal. Mystal, who apparently willingly took on the job of housing the hair follicles that Reid has longsince eschewed, was among the many who were outraged enough to take to X (there’s an intelligent choice) on a Sunday to voice his lament, as Hawkinson related:
“I owe the television part of my career to Joy Reid, as do so many other Black voices y’all never would have heard of if not for her,… Mystal wrote. “And *that’s* why she’s gone. They can treat black folks as interchangeable, but everybody Black knows that Joy was indispensable.”
I’d contend that Mystal might owe even more of his television career to the fact that he resembles an electrocuted Kenan Thompson, and Thompson’s lampooning of him in a January 2024 episode of SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE likely reached millions more people than any appearance on THE REID OUT, but I digress.
And as THE WRAP’s Stephanie Kaloi reported, he wasn’t the only disgruntled supporter who felt the need to post on social media yesterday:
Everytime MSNBC has a ‘shakeup’ the Black woman solo led show is ALWAYS the first to go,” wrote Ambassador Digital Magazine editor-in-chief Musa Jackson on Threads. “Tamron Hall, Tiffany Cross, Zerlina Maxwell and now Joy Reid. Boycott MSNBC.” Hall, who departed the network in 2017, also commented on Reid’s ousting. “Where there is JOY there is friendship and love,” she wrote on Threads. “@joyannreid is the core of a sisterhood where we see each other and rise together. Next Chapter. Love you Joy Reid @thereidout.”
I guess Jackson somehow missed the fact that Alex Wagner lost her even more prominent time slot on the very same day. And as for Hall, kudos for her at least a more encouraging and balanced approach. Because since she’s left MSNBC she’s actually figured out that a broader base of topics and guests can actually pay off. Last week VARIETY’s Michael Schneider reported this little nugget that almost got dusted under the rug:
Nationally syndicated talker “Tamron Hall” has been renewed for a seventh season, Variety has learned. The daytime strip, which has become Disney’s second longest-running syndicated talker (behind “Live with Kelly and Mark”) has been picked up for another season by major market ABC-owned TV stations and Hearst Television. That gives it a firm go for the 2025-2026 TV season. “
” It’s no secret I find inspiration in numbers. For many, the number seven represents a completion for us. For my team and I, season seven represents the continued growth of the show built by the Tam Fam,” Hall said in a statement.
And speaking of numbers, Schneider offered up these for support:
According to Disney, “Tamron Hall” is among the top three most-viewed syndicated talk shows on linear with total viewers. In digital, Disney says the show has seen video views grow by 39%, with a 32% bump in YouTube followers.
You see what happens when one doesn’t fixate on Thanksgiving, a holiday Reid first linked to slavery and subsequently defied anyone who chose not to vote the way she urged not to expect her to serve them anything at her celebration?
You want to know what else Hall discovered that, frankly, researchers and TV strategists like moi already knew? Older audiences, particularly Black females, watch a lot of daytime television. And as of today in many major markets she’s going to be challenged as CBS launches the first new original daytime soap opera in nearly a quarter of a century, BEYOND THE GATES. You think maybe Hall–or, heaven forbid, the cast of BEYOND THE GATES–might have deserved at least a shout-out, if not a story on how they’re impacting the discourse and discussion that Reid was being handsomely paid to steer? In Black History Month no less?
Look, I concede it’s nay impossible for someone who fits my demography not to be accused of bias. I’ve heard such accusations for decades from people far more balanced than Reid or her minions. I’m pretty sure Kutler has as well. And while it’s low-hanging fruit to accuse MSNBC of bending yet another knee to accommodate the social media rants of a clearly joy-filled Fat Orange Jesus, I’ll push back that that’s an insult to objectivity and business sense. No one is calling for Reid to be silenced completely. She just simply hasn’t earned the right to do so in prime time on a network that is somehow hoping to attract a large enough audience for its time–or, perhaps itself–to be favorably sold.
Tamron Hall figured it out. I’m going to hold out a sliver of hope that Reid might someday follow suit, especially since we’re about as far away from Thanksgiving in the calendar year as possible. She’ll apparently have a good deal of time to do so. Exit (appropriately), Stage Left.
Until next time…