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Chris Licht Is Out At CNN After Tumultuous Tenure

Ted Johnson and Dominic Patten
·9 min read

Chris Licht is stepping down as the chairman and CEO of CNN Worldwide, ending a tumultuous tenure as the first leader of the network under parent Warner Bros. Discovery.

Licht’s departure comes after a bombshell profile in The Atlantic infuriated staffers, already upset over the way that a recent town hall with President Donald Trump was handled.

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Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav told staffers in CNN’s morning call that Licht was leaving and that a search was on for a new CEO. “It didn’t work out,” he said.

In a memo to staffers, Zaslav wrote, “This job was never going to be easy, especially at a time of great disruption and transformation, and Chris poured his heart and soul into it. He has a deep love for journalism and this business and that has been evident throughout his tenure. Unfortunately, things did not work out the way we had hoped – and ultimately that’s on me. I take responsibility.”

Top executives Amy Entelis, executive vice president of talent and content development; Eric Sherling, EVP of U.S. programming; and Virginia Moseley, EVP of editorial, will serve as the acting leadership team in the interim, Zaslav said, and they will be joined by David Leavy. Leavy, a top aide to Zaslav, was named COO of CNN last week, leading to speculation that Licht’s time at the network was short. Entelis, Sherling and Moseley are all veterans of the network who pre-dated Licht’s tenure.

Entelis also was among the executives who served as interim leader in between the tenure of CEO Jeff Zucker and Licht. Her name was quickly mentioned as a potential permanent CEO, given her experience in the newsroom, which included overseeing original series and films.

Zaslav indicated that the network would not be rushing a decision. “We have great confidence in this group and will fully support them until a new CEO is named,” he said. “We are in good hands, allowing us to take the time we need to run a thoughtful and thorough search for a new leader.”

There also reports that some of the top executives who worked with Licht, including Kris Coratti Kelly, the head of global communications, and Matt Dornic, head of strategic communications, would be exiting, but no official announcement has yet been made.

Licht has been with the network for just over a year, having had a series of successes in helping to launch Morning Joe on MSNBC, revitalize CBS’s morning show and then taken the reins of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, which overtook The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon in the ratings.

But even before he started in May, 2022, Licht was tasked with shutting down CNN+, its costly subscription streaming service that was launched just weeks earlier. As Warner Bros. Discovery instituted company wide cuts, Licht scaled by the network’s original series and original films units, while presiding over the layoffs of hundreds of staffers. Many at the network are fearing additional cuts later this year.

CNN’s ratings continued to fall during his tenure. An attempt to revitalize the morning show has sputtered with the forced pairing of Don Lemon, Kaitlan Collins and Poppy Harlow. Lemon eventually was fired by Licht.

Licht also faced continued troubles in trying to shore up CNN’s nighttime schedule. A plan to program the key 9 p.m. ET slot — vacant since predecessor Zucker fired Chris Cuomo — only recently came to fruition. Collins, a favorite of Licht’s, was named last month to serve as permanent occupant of the slot. But that came after other attempts to fill the time period with a mixture of big get interviews and special events, which seldom popped in the ratings. In the past month, CNN has found itself losing the 8 p.m. ET time slot to Newsmax on some nights. Licht did announce a new show with Gayle King and Charles Barkley, but it is scheduled to air only once a week starting in the fall.

More troublesome for Licht was the support of the staff, many of whom were fiercely loyal to Zucker and wary of moves that looked by the network was moving to the right as a way to appease supporters of Donald Trump. Perhaps most concerning to staffers were comments made by John Malone, top shareholder in Discovery, in November, 2021, months before Discovery was set to take control of CNN-parent WarnerMedia. Malone told CNBC that he wanted CNN to “evolve back to the kind of journalism that it started with, and actually have journalists, which would be unique and refreshing.” Malone’s comments proved especially disconcerting to the network’s D.C. bureau, which had prided itself on withstanding the attacks on the network by Trump when he was in the White House, and raised fears that CNN would move toward something more akin to Fox News.

Licht believed that the network had drifted during the Trump years into that of an oppositional voice, and when he took the helm he cut back on commentary in favor of playing up the network’s newsgathering. Republicans began to return to the network as guests, and Trump himself returned last month for a town hall.

That event, moderated by Collins, enraged network staffers, as viewers saw Trump being cheered on by the audience, as if he were at another rally. Collins tried to press him on a number of questions, but critics saw it as giving Trump a platform to spew more false claims. Christiane Amanpour, the network’s chief international anchor, went public in her criticism. While there was some praise for Collins, many thought that she had been put in an impossible situation.

The latest crisis for Licht came on Friday, when The Atlantic’s Tim Alberta, granted extensive access, published a 15,000-word profile. The piece rattled staffers, as it featured Licht criticizing the network’s previous coverage of Covid, among other things, while portraying him as aloof. It also raised questions about whether moves were made during the Trump town hall to appease the former president and his allies, particularly in the placement of pundits before and after the program.

Licht apologized for the piece in a call with staffers on Monday, and said that he planned to move his New York office from the corporate floor to the news editorial floor. But a number said that it was not enough. “Too little, too late,” said one on-air journalist, saying that Licht had lost trust with the newsroom and was the wrong person for the job. Although Licht said that he would fight to win the trust of the newsroom, CNN’s media reporter Oliver Darcy reported that the “near-universal sentiment” among staffers was that Licht had “lost the room.” The Wall Street Journal reported that star anchors like Anderson Cooper and Erin Burnett expressed their concerns to management about Licht’s ability to continue in the post.

Zaslav did not give any indication of a timeline to find a permanent CEO. One former CNN staffer noted that Licht is only the latest figure to take the helm of a media organization following the tenure of a popular predecessor, given the loyalty that many CNN staffers had toward Zucker. An example is the short tenure of Bob Chapek as CEO of Disney, following in the footsteps of Bob Iger, who returned last November.

At midmorning, Warner Bros. Discovery stock was up 3.22% on NASDAQ at $12.50.

Whoever succeeds Licht may have the advantage of an expected audience uptick with the 2024 election cycle, but the network still faces significant headwinds, including further cutbacks at Warner Bros. Discovery, a soft ad market and a drop in revenue. According to The New York Times, CNN posted about $750 million in profit last year, down from $1.25 billion the previous year. That drop included $200 million in one-time losses from CNN+ and its closure. There is also the long-term impact of cord-cutting and the pressure it puts on per-subscriber fees, the lifeblood of networks and the industry as a whole.

But there also will be plenty of skepticism that a back-to-CNN basics, tack-to-the-center approach even will work in an environment where consumers are inundated with content choices. During Zucker’s tenure, when CNN had become a lightning rod on the right, Nexstar launched NewsNation with the promise of unbiased journalism. The audience has been minimal, and even Nexstar has shifted its approach to playing up certain personalities in primetime, chief among them Cuomo.

MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough, Licht’s partner in launching Morning Joe, defended him on the air on Monday, noting that Zucker’s ratings had fallen considerably in his final years. On Wednesday, Scarborough wrote on Twitter, “Chris will be better for what he has learned through this painful process. We learn more from our failures than our victories. Any winner will tell you that.”

Puck first reported on Licht’s exit.

Zaslav’s memo announcing Licht’s departure is below:

All,

This morning we are announcing that Chris Licht will be leaving CNN and we will be conducting a wide search, internally and externally, for a new leader. I wanted you to hear this news directly from me as it impacts you and your teams.

I have known Chris for many years and have enormous respect for him, personally and professionally. This job was never going to be easy, especially at a time of great disruption and transformation, and Chris poured his heart and soul into it. He has a deep love for journalism and this business and that has been evident throughout his tenure. Unfortunately, things did not work out the way we had hoped – and ultimately that’s on me. I take responsibility. Needless to say, we appreciate Chris’ efforts and dedication and wish him all the best.

We have put in place a solid transition plan with the appointment of an acting leadership team made up of experienced programming executives… Amy Entelis, EVP, Talent & Content Development, Virginia Moseley, EVP, Editorial, and Eric Sherling, EVP, U.S. Programming, along with David Leavy, COO, on the commercial side. We have great confidence in this group and will fully support them until a new CEO is named. We are in good hands, allowing us to take the time we need to run a thoughtful and thorough search for a new leader. I recognize that changes like this can be stressful and appreciate your continued patience as we move through this process.

You’ve heard me say it many times: CNN has the greatest journalists in the world… we are deeply committed to supporting them and the critical work that CNN does every day. We must get this right – and we will!

David

More to come.

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