The Biggest TV News Departures and Shake-Ups of 2024

Change doesn’t always happen overnight…sometimes it takes a whole year. And you don’t need to be an expert reader of tea leaves to recognize that 2024 was a pivot point for TV news.

The steady accumulation of resignations, promotions, job changes and company reorganizations – as well as a few notable departures of celebrated journalists – over the past 12 months confirm that a very different landscape awaits the industry beyond that proverbial door revolving in 2025.

To kick off the last full week of 2024, TVNewser looks back at some of the biggest departures, career relaunches and shocks of this calendar year — and how they contributed to the larger climate of change around TV news.

January-March

• Medhi Hasan he was the first prominent journalist to leave his outlet at the top of 2024. In January, even MSNBC anchors announced that he was exiting the network following the cancellation of The Medhi Hasan Show the previous November. Hasan later became independent launching the Substack-based media organization Zeteo – a move that other Newsers will follow as the year unfolds.
• Former host of CBS Sunday Morning Charles Osgood died at 91 on January 23eight years later he withdrew from the program. Osgood’s soothing voice defined Sunday morning for many viewers during his 22-year tenure at CBS and evoked a bygone era of broadcasting. “He was one of the best broadcast stylists and one of the last,” his friend and current CBS Sunday Morning host Jane Pauley observed in a statement.
• CNN began its year of transformation under CEO Mark Thompson in February from reviewing his weekday morning schedule. Early Start was rebranded as CNN This Morning-with Phil Mattingly and Poppy Harlow starting from the previous version of the last show (Harlow left CNN entirely in April)-while CNN News Central first moved into the AM. Thompson later he will describe his bigger plans for the network, including a renewed emphasis on digital products.
• Elon Musk telegraphed his turn to the right at the beginning of the year, abruptly interrupting the former CNN anchor Don LemonThe much-heralded collaboration of X, ex-Twitter. Lemon interviewed Musk before the launch of The Don Lemon Show and asked questions that his new boss clearly did not care to answer. “We had a good conversation,” Lemon wrote after Musk canceled his yet-to-be-debuted series. “Clearly he felt differently.” Lemon deactivated his X account in November after the presidential election.
• In another short term, former RNC chairman is vocal Donald Trump support Ronna McDaniel was hired and then shot by NBC News over five days in March. His impending arrival has created a furor among prominent MSNBC hosts –most notably Rachel Maddow— and quickly headed up the NBCUniversal group president Cesar Count to cut ties with McDaniel. The incident reflects MSNBC attention to its largely progressive audience as the election cycle approached.