At the start of the 2024 US presidential campaign, which traditionally gives a major boost to audiences and news channel revenues, it is not the best time to make a revolution. But, after several weeks of turmoil within the editorial staff, the CEO of CNN, Chris Licht, will leave the management of the American television channel, announced on Wednesday June 7, the Warner Bros Discovery group. CNN’s parent company officials have yet to name a successor.

Chris Licht took the reins of the oldest continuous news channel in the United States in May 2022, after the sudden departure of the emblematic boss Jeff Zucker, who had not told his leaders about his romantic relationship with a CNN executive. Since then, the 50-year-old has tried to relaunch the old lady of continuous news, whose audiences are suffering from competition with its conservative rival Fox News, but also with MSNBC, with a more left-wing editorial line.

He has made several changes to the program schedule, without success so far, and attempted a few media stunts, first of all the live broadcast in public with Donald Trump as a guest, in mid-May. This program was badly received by part of the public but also within the editorial staff, who saw in it a platform offered without reservation to the former president, in front of an audience of Republican sympathizers for the most part won over to his cause.

In addition, the show’s effect on audiences was short-lived, as, a few days later, CNN fell behind the small conservative channel Newsmax in the day’s rankings.

Clean break with his teams

Chris Licht’s position was further weakened by the publication, on June 2, of a very long article in The Atlantic magazine, which underlined the clear break between the leader and his teams.

“The task was not an easy one, especially at a time of great upheaval and transformation, and Chris put his heart into it,” CNN parent company Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav said in a post. internal note obtained by Agence France-Presse. “Unfortunately things didn’t go as we had hoped and in the end I take responsibility,” he added.

The arrival of Chris Licht at CNN corresponded to a change of era within the channel, now part of the new unit Warner Bros Discovery, merger of the television group Discovery with its competitor Warner Bros, which also includes the HBO channel and the HBO Max streaming platform, recently rebranded as Max.

“The Land of Live Journalism”

The boss of Discovery, David Zaslav, who became that of the merged group, imposed cost reductions and more restraint in spending related to content, a break for Warner Bros.

“Clearly [Chris Licht] didn’t look well to the editors, but the question is whether it was for his management or because he was trying to push her in a direction she didn’t want go,” said DePauw University professor Jeffrey McCall.

“Chris Licht tried to bring CNN back to the field of direct journalism”, in a less subjective tone, continues the academic, for whom the channel “had become ideologically oriented”, which “had limited their audience to the left”, field already occupied by MSNBC.

“Licht and his bosses are wrong to think that people want information that’s right in the middle” editorially, said columnist Cynthia Tucker, whose posts appear in several newspapers. “If that were the case, [public broadcaster] PBS,” very subdued, “would be at the top of the ratings. ยป

News of Chris Licht’s departure was welcomed by Wall Street. Warner Bros. Discovery stock was up 4.50% around noon New York time.