Ousted CNN chief Chris Licht has criticized the traditional media, including his former colleagues, for being untrustworthy in a scathing speech about his former industry.
Licht, 53, was fired from CNN in June 2023 and has yet to re-enter the media field after his dramatic elimination.
On Tuesday, the former CEO sat down with Yahoo Finance to discuss how he believes legacy media, which includes CNN, although he did not directly name the company, has lost its way with the American people.
“The facts are that people have lost trust in traditional media,” he told Yahoo Finance host Seana Smith.
‘I’m not the one saying that, it’s a demonstrable fact that it hasn’t happened in the last six months. This is something that has been happening for a long time and people are ignoring it.”
Even the company’s election night coverage saw a huge drop in viewership, with numbers falling below MSNBC since the company’s launch, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
On Tuesday, Chris Licht sat down with Yahoo Finance to discuss the current industry and how he thinks legacy media, which includes CNN, although he didn’t name the company directly, has lost people.
‘The reality is that people have lost trust in traditional media. I’m not the one saying that, it’s a demonstrable fact that it hasn’t happened in the last six months. “That’s something that’s been happening for a long time and people are disconnecting,” he said.
CNN drew 5.1 million viewers, while MSNBC had 6.01 million. Meanwhile, Fox News led with 10.32 million, according to THR.
During CNN’s primetime shows in 2022, it averaged 828,000 viewers, significantly lower than 2020 numbers, where it watched around 1.8 million, according to Pew Research Center.
MSNBC posted slightly lower numbers than CNN, while Fox News surpassed both with an average of 2.1 million viewers in 2022 and 3.1 million in 2020.
Licht, who started in local news, believes traditional media needs to find a way to “reconnect with people and become relevant in their lives again.”
It acknowledges that viewership was weakened by a “low-trust society” between consumers and the media and between fact and fiction.
“There are reliable sources of information and then there are reliable opinions, and I think those two worlds should be very separate,” he told Yahoo Finance.
“I think part of the problem is that they’ve gotten mixed up and you know media organizations will try very hard to say, ‘No, No, no, this is our news collection and this is our opinion”, but in the world people do not make that distinction that I have found.
‘Sosomeone has to figure out how restore trust and let these be the facts and then let people go and have their opinions.’
Licht, who started in local news, believes traditional media needs to find a way to “reconnect with people and become relevant in their lives again.”
He went on to say that readers and viewers should “come armed with the real facts,” rather than being told what to think or having the truth twisted in many ways.
‘We used to have a set of facts and then we could have 30 discussions about that set of facts. Now you have 30 sets of facts and a thousand discussions around those sets of facts. And that has to change or we will be in big trouble as a society,” he said.
He and Smith also discussed the rise of fake news, a phrase coined by President-elect Donald Trump that began during his first presidency.
Although Licht believes it is “bigger than just a Trump presidency,” his advice to his former colleagues was to “take advantage of whatever pitches are made.”
‘Don’t say, “Well, this means this and that means that’s going to happen.” Say, “He did this,” and then let’s discuss what that means. Not, “Well, this is going to mean this,” because a lot of times the media gets into trouble when they predict things.
“I would say as an observer, there’s been a lot of hyperbole about what a Trump presidency will mean and it’s the end of democracy.”
CNN’s falling numbers have left staff feeling “scared and frustrated” by impending layoffs.
Stars including Jake Tapper and Wolf Blitzer have reportedly been denied increases to their multimillion-dollar salaries as the network’s biggest names fear for their futures.
On-screen favorite Chris Wallace also left the network earlier this week, although he insisted he did so on his own terms. Other employees are concerned about more layoffs, after the company laid off 100 earlier this year.
On-screen favorite Chris Wallace also left the network earlier this week, although he insisted he did so on his own terms.
A former CNN employee said fox news that after news of the layoffs spread, staff across the company felt “very sad and deeply frustrated.”
“Feelings that are pervasive throughout the organization among those who have been here a long time and feel a deep personal connection to having helped build the organization,” the anonymous staffer added.
News of CNN’s budget cuts and layoffs first broke after an explosive report from Puck News, warning that network executives are willing to take drastic measures to save the company’s reputation.
Although there is no mention of who might be on the chopping block, there are fears that the cuts could affect everyone, from low-level staff to those like Anderson Cooper and his $20 million-a-year salary.
“In the coming months, I’m told, CNN will implement another round of layoffs affecting hundreds of employees across the organization,” journalist Dylan Byers wrote on Friday, referencing CNN’s recent 100-person layoff seen over the summer.
The new round of layoffs, experts said, will be more geared toward the production side of the company, but on-screen “talent” will also be affected.