After nine years, Tv Host Joy Ann Reid is leaving the network as the company announced it is canceling her show including Alex Wagner and Jonathan Capehart’s evening programming as part of a major restructuring at the network.
Following the announcement, #Winwithblackwomen, a community dedicated to the advancement of Black women, scheduled an emergency zoom call in support of Reid, who also joined the call.
In the meeting, Joy expressed her disappointment and sadness of her show ending and talked about her initial guilt for covering The Black Lives Matter Movement, justice for Asian Americans, and denouncing violence in Gaza but says she isn’t sorry.
“My show had value,” said Joy. “I’m not sorry, I am not sorry that I stood up for those things… I am not sorry, I am just proud of my show.”
This all comes as MSNBC President Rashida Jones, the first Black executive to lead a cable news network stepped down last month after four years at the company. It is rumored that her departure is a result of disagreement over the direction of the network amid the pending buyout to Comcast.
In her stead, the company announced her Interim replacement, Rebecca Kutler, a former CNN executive. Since taking over, kutler has made drastic changes across the networks daytime, weekend, and primetime schedules while also laying off nearly 100 of its union staffers at the same time.
While the company stands on this being part of the company going a different direction, viewers and advocates are sounding the alarm on the shift, insisting that The Reid Out’s cancellation is not a coincidental casualty but an act of retaliation. As for Wagner and Capehart, fellow news colleagues believe that their demotion is only another example of how the network values its POC reporters given the network’s troubled past with its Black journalists and pointed out its decision to get rid of two of its only primetime shows anchored by persons of color as a clear message.
In response to the news, longtime TV Host Rachel Maddow criticized the network on air calling it a “mistake” to let the former primetime host walk out.
“ In all of the jobs I have had in all of the years I have been alive there is no colleague for whom I’ve had more affection and more respect than Joy Reid.” Maddow said. “Personally I think that it is a bad mistake to let her walk out the door, it’s not my call. I understand that but that is what I think.”
Wagner and Capehart have not said anything about the decision, but the network has announced that in place for the 7pm show it will debut a new lineup show with MSNBC reporters Symone Sanders Townsend, Michael Steele, and Alicia Menendez.