Fox News’ Howard Kurtz sought out a silver lining as he summarized how the ousters of Tucker Carlson and Don Lemon rocked the cable news world.
The MediaBuzz host held a segment on Sunday where he dove into the reports that Fox’s top brass was “disturbed” by Carlson and decided to fire him after reviewing his private texts. Reports have also described how Carlson wanted people to know he privately called a senior Fox executive the c-word.
Kurtz acknowledged that Abby Grossberg’s lawsuit against Fox News “may have been a factor [for the firing] as well,” given how the former Fox booker is accusing Carlson of fomenting a misogynistic, toxic work environment at the network. Shortly after that, Kurtz turned to Lemon’s firing from CNN, focusing on the dispute between Lemon and CNN about the events leading up to his public dismissal.
Kurtz wanted to know why Lemon’s firing happened when it did, seeing as he was bogged down by controversy in the weeks beforehand. Kurtz tied all of this in with Jeff Shell’s ouster as NBCUniversal CEO after he admitted to an “inappropriate relationship” with CNBC’s Hadley Gamble.
This culminated with Kurtz’s assessment on what the aftermath could look like for news networks.
The big picture raised by the dismissals at Fox and CNN is whether we are entering a new era in which some limits are imposed on what even the most popular hosts can say. Management at all the networks may be more likely to rein in their top talent and insist on fact-checking rather than risk embarrassment or lawsuits for the airing of false information. That, if it comes to pass, might just be a worthwhile outcome.
Watch above via Fox News.
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