NBC's Ronna Revolt Shows The Power Journalists Have To Change Their Orgs
NBC's Ronna Revolt Shows The Power Journalists Have To Change Their Orgs
NBC's hiring of Ronna McDaniel showcased the problem with media executives' pursuit of ratings and false balance. Her firing proved journalists have the power to push execs to pursue truth instead.
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The hiring and firing of former RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniels by NBC News shows us exactly what is wrong with the decision-making of mainstream media executives and the power that organized journalists have to change those decisions.
Over the past five days, we saw a model for how journalists can make an impact on the direction of their media organizations. They aren’t powerless and don’t have to blindly follow the decisions that impact their coverage. If they speak out in an organized and unified manner about an editorial direction from management they disagree with, they can change that direction.
Let’s dive into what happened.
On Friday of last week, former RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, a participant in Donald Trump’s plot to overturn the 2020 election, had just been hired as a paid NBC News Contributor.
The public backlash was fierce and immediate, but NBC News still moved forward with their decision, announcing that McDaniel would appear on NBC’s Meet The Press on Sunday, March 24.
Host Kristen Welker opened up the show by stating, “In full disclosure to our viewers, this interview was scheduled weeks before it was announced that McDaniel had become a paid NBC News contributor. This will be a news interview, and I was not involved in her hiring.”
Welker’s disclaimer was eye-brow-raising and showcased the clear distinction that she wasn’t aware NBC was intent on hiring McDaniel when she booked the interview. Already, we could see that journalists were not in the loop of the hiring decision by NBC executives.
Then, the interview began. Welker did a very good job of holding Ronna McDaniel to account for her conduct at the RNC, her own role in the effort to overturn the election, and her attempts to whitewash Trump’s role in January 6.
Under McDaniel’s leadership, the RNC declared January 6 and the overall plot to overturn the 2020 election “legitimate political discourse.” McDaniel herself participated in that plot when she pressured state legislators not to certify Biden’s win. In spite of these facts and Welker’s pushback, McDaniel sought to defend her conduct and soften her extremism.
McDaniel claimed that Trump’s promise to pardon January 6 prisoners went too far, and she pivoted on her stance that the election was “rigged,” a claim she repeatedly made as RNC Chair. McDaniel now says Biden is the legitimate president. But, of course, she still said she would vote for Trump.
After watching this interview, it was very clear that Ronna McDaniel was going to try to use her NBC contributor gig to make a more palatable pro-Trump argument to moderate Republicans and right-leaning Independents (essentially Nikki Haley voters), and she was going to be getting paid $300k a year by NBC to do it.
Fortunately, her plan was disrupted by NBC journalists.
The NBC Journalist Revolt
In a powerful moment live on air, right after McDaniel’s interview, former Meet The Press host Chuck Todd sat down with Kristen Welker and directly called out NBC for hiring Ronna McDaniel.
Todd spotlighted her “gaslighting” history at the RNC and criticized the network’s logic behind her hiring. He said NBC bosses owe Welker an apology for putting her in this “impossible” situation. Todd noted that Welker found out McDaniel was being paid after the interview was already booked. “She has credibility issues that she still has to deal with,” Todd said of McDaniel.
Todd also explained why she was hired and his issues with it: “When NBC News made the decision to give her NBC News’s credibility, you gotta ask yourself what does she bring NBC News. And when we make deals like this, and I’ve been at this company for a long time, you’re doing it for access… and we can have a journalistic ethics debate about that.”
This was stunning coming from Chuck Todd, who has been at NBC News for nearly two decades. Todd calling out access journalism and the problems with hiring a known liar was something many never thought they’d see. It didn’t stop there. Other big NBC names followed suit and were even more blunt in their condemnations.
Over the weekend, MSNBC President Rashida Jones told MSNBC employees that Ronna McDaniel would not appear on MSNBC. But that didn’t prevent the continued revolt among top talent from the network.
On Monday morning, Morning Joe hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski spoke out: “To be clear, we believe NBC News should seek out conservative Republican voices to provide balance in their election coverage. But it should be conservative Republicans, not a person who used her position of power to be an anti-democracy election denier, and we hope NBC will reconsider its decision. It goes without saying that she will not be a guest on Morning Joe in her capacity as a paid contributor.”
MSNBC hosts Joy Reid, Chris Hayes, Nicolle Wallace, Jen Psaki, and Lawrence O’Donnell all spoke out against McDaniel’s hiring. One of the most powerful callouts came from MSNBC primetime host Rachel Maddow.
Maddow joined this chorus of voices by opening her show with an extensive segment on Ronna McDaniel’s role in Trump’s plot to overturn the 2020 election. Maddow opposed the hiring in no uncertain terms:
“I want to associate myself with all my colleagues at MSNBC and NBC News who have voiced loud and principled objections to our company for putting on the payroll someone who hasn’t just attacked us as journalists, but someone who is part of an ongoing project to get rid of our system of government. Someone who is still trying to convince Americans that this election stuff doesn’t really work. That this last election wasn’t a real result. That American elections are fraudulent.“
“The fact that Ms. McDaniel is on the payroll at NBC News — to me that is inexplicable, and I hope they will reverse their decision,” Maddow continued, then spoke directly to NBC leadership. “Take a minute, acknowledge that maybe it wasn’t the right call. It is a sign of strength, not weakness, to acknowledge when you are wrong. And our country needs us to be strong right now.”
Maddow’s segment aired on Monday night. By Tuesday evening, NBCUniversal Chairman Cesar Conde sent a memo to employees announcing that NBC had reversed its decision to hire Ronna McDaniel. Conde apologized and took responsibility for approving the decision after a “collective recommendation by some members of our leadership team.”
Conde explained that their “initial decision was made because of our deep commitment to presenting our audiences with a widely diverse set of viewpoints and experiences.” Conde did not make any mention of the democracy-eroding impact of Ronna McDaniel’s time at the RNC or acknowledge her role in the plot to overturn the 2020 election. Instead, he ended by saying, “We will redouble our efforts to seek voices that represent different parts of the political spectrum.”
McDaniel’s tenure at NBC lasted just four days, or 3/10s of a Scaramucci.
The Problem With Media Executives And The Power Of Journalists
McDaniel’s hiring was reportedly supported unanimously by NBC leadership. The fact none of them foresaw how problematic her hiring was or how big the backlash would be is emblematic of media executive blind spots and the disconnect they have with their journalistic talent.
McDaniel’s hiring reportedly came about after she became friendly with NBC executives during their negotiations over hosting their Republican debate. Once she announced she was leaving the RNC, NBC News and other networks began talks with her for a contributor gig, but NBC won out with their $300k price tag and pre-existing relationship with McDaniel.
My very first article in this newsletter was about the false equivalency and both sideism that stems from this attempt at false balance many mainstream media organizations push under the guise of airing “diverse” viewpoints. As many have said, airing diverse viewpoints is fine. But knowingly airing malicious disinformation from people who are seeking to undermine American democracy is just plain unethical.
News network executives continue to make decisions that are totally disconnected from our political reality. We saw this same attempted shift to the right by former CNN CEO Chris Licht, who was also ousted after public and internal backlash from employees in reaction to the disastrous Trump-CNN Town Hall.
News executives are always going to chase viewers and the bottom line. That will never change until the underlying media business models and incentive structures change. But what we’re seeing now is that when media employees unify, they can impact top-level decision-making.
The firing of Ronna McDaniel was the result of public backlash and countless NBC journalists speaking out against their own employer, which is not an easy task. The message was loud, clear, and received.
In an era of resurgent organized labor in other industries, it was heartening to see such rapid results from organized employees in the media industry - where these kinds of decisions have a direct impact on our democracy.
In a nutshell, NBC's hiring of Ronna McDaniel showcased the problem with media executives' pursuit of ratings and false balance. Her firing proved journalists have the power to push their executives to pursue truth and uphold democracy instead.
I hope we see more of this organized effort from the public and journalists when media executives make poor decisions. This election is too important for unforced errors.
