Top of the Ticker: Oliver Darcy’s recent departure from CNN felt sudden and rushed, suggesting that everything was not quite right between the Reliable Sources scribe and his former employers. Since departing CNN to pursue the start-up Status newsletter, Darcy has been making the rounds, chatting with Claire Atkinson’s The Media Mix newsletter, Mediaite and Jay Rosen among other journos. In each of those interviews, he’s sought to squash any notion of bad blood between him and CNN, instead chalking his departure up to a personal decision.
New Gig: Axios’ national political correspondent Alex Thompson has joined CNN in a contributor role as a political analyst. The move was announced on the Sunday edition of Inside Politics with Manu Raju. Thompson joined the network as the 2024 Democratic National Convention got underway this week, and he’s not the only Axios employee pulling double duty. Media correspondent Sara Fischer joined the network in October 2022 as an on-air contributor on the media beat.
Some personal news: I’m joining the amazing team at @CNN as a contributor.
Thx to @mkraju for the shout out this AM.
(Will still be writing and reporting w/ Axios, you’re just gonna find it harder to avoid me now).
pic.twitter.com/eQB4bEnR2j— Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) August 18, 2024
Vlad in the Spotlight: CBS News correspondent Vladimir Duthiers received the Los Angeles Times profile treatment, speaking to Stephen Battaglio about his unorthodox journalism journey. Duthiers had enjoyed a successful position in finance, but pivoted to a new career in journalism that required him to start at the bottom as a 40-year-old intern. “My experience is that if you make yourself indispensable and you show true passion for this craft, you will be able to get a job,” Duthiers observed.
From intern to morning news rockstar, our very own @vladduthierscbs is featured in @latimes!@gayleking and @Jerickaduncan give Vlad a much-deserved shout out for all he brings to our newsroom. pic.twitter.com/a0qYTzBGem
— CBS Mornings (@CBSMornings) August 20, 2024
More Hours in the Day: Looks like Anne-Marie Green won’t setting her alarm for midnight anymore. The early morning CBS News 24/7 anchor is moving to 48 Hours as a full-time correspondent. In a note to staff, 48 Hours executive producer Judy Tygard called Green a “big part of the 48 Hours family.” The journalist hosts the Post Mortem podcast and has also been a contributor to the long-running newsmagazine, reporting the top-rated 2023 episode, “The Death of an Officer’s Wife.”
High Scores: The NBCU News Group is celebrating its rank as the top digital news organization for July 2024, according to Comscore. The news group’s digital properties—which included NBC News, TODAY, MSNBC and CNBC—recorded 160 million monthly unique visitors, which marks its best month on record as a public entity since April 2021. NBCNews.com specifically reached 115 million unique visitors, ahead of the New York Times and the Washington Post, among others.
Fox News also had Comscore digital wins to share from July: the digital arm attracted 119 milion multiplatform unique visitors, while FoxBusiness.com saw 26.7 million multiplatform UVs. Fox News Digital also brought in 3.9 billion total multiplatform minutes and 1.9 billion total multiplatform views, its best month in both categories since January 2021.
Meanwhile, over at Newsmax, the conservative-leaning cable channel reported a July audience of 22.6 million viewers. That’s a +46% improvement over its performance in June and a +68% increase compared to the same month in 2023.
