Veteran Host/Senior Correspondent Rita Cosby Leaves Fox News; Two Sides Couldn’t Agree On Contract Renewal

Variety’s Michael Learmonth has a big scoop: “Fox News Channel will not renew a contract with weekend host Rita Cosby, as the two sides couldn’t come to an agreement on an extension, the network said.” Cosby has been with FNC since 1996; she anchored The Big Story Weekend Edition on Saturdays and Fox News Live on Sundays. “Cosby will leave the network immediately. No replacement host has been appointed, nor has a decision been made on the future of the shows, Fox News said.”

> Would you laugh if I suggested Cosby could end up at MSNBC, perhaps in a weekday primetime spot?

> Cosby’s biography has already been scrubbed from FOXNews.com. An old speakers bureau bio calls her “the youngest senior news correspondent in network television.”

> Sept. 7: Cosby says: “In the news business, there are always unpredictable things. You can thrive on it or go to an insane asylum, and I prefer to thrive.”