CNN chief Chris Licht is out at the network, according to new reports Wednesday morning. The move comes amid several controversies during his brief stint there.
The embattled network president was brought in after the company split with Jeff Zucker, who oversaw a massive spike in ratings while Donald Trump was in office, but a massive drop in audience after he left office. The drop in ratings and revenue led to several rounds of layoffs at the network.
There has also been a lot of internal grumbling in the wake of the recent CNN Town Hall with former president Donald Trump. That internal grumbling has spilled over into the public . Via my colleague Bonchie:
On Saturday, news that Licht had been removed from overseeing the left-wing network’s business operations broke. That signaled that David Zaslav, head of Warner Brothers Discover (which owns CNN), had lost faith in his CEO’s ability to keep things running.
Now, the internal civil war has gone public, and Licht’s underlings are attacking him out in the open. Oliver Darcy, who inexplicably escaped the purge at the network that saw Brian Stelter kicked to the curb, took a shot at Licht in his newsletter.
The news now that Licht is out at the network is coming from sources who were briefed on the matter, according to multiple outlets.
CNN’s future is still up in the air.