Former Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel was fired on Tuesday by NBC News. She was hired as a political analyst and sparked major controversy from the network’s established anchors. According to CNN, McDaniel had a large role in denying and subverting the results of the 2020 elections as she led several attacks on the press.
The NBCUniversal News Group President Cesar Conde expressed his apologies to the staff members who were frustrated with the hiring of McDaniel. In his statement, he expressed that he listened to the concerns brought up to him and that upon these complaints, McDaniel would be released from her position at NBC.
“There is no doubt that the last several days have been difficult for the News Group. After listening to the legitimate concerns of many of you, I have decided that Ronna McDaniel will not be an NBC News contributor.”
He then continues, “I want to personally apologize to our team members who felt we let them down. While this was a collective recommendation by some members of our leadership team, I approved it and take full responsibility for it.”
The decision to oust McDaniel follows a very public expression of concern about her hiring by anchors and journalists already on the NBC news team. McDaniel led several attacks on news stations such as NBC in the wake of attempting to overturn the 2020 election. Most notably, during the election, while she was still the head of the RNC she took part in a phone call with Michigan officials attempting to not certify the results from the Detroit area, where Joe Biden already was ahead significantly. According to CNN, on the phone call, she told officials “Do not sign it. … We will get you attorneys.”
Based on actions such as these, those at NBC were outraged to hear that she would be joining the team. On the cable channel MSNBC, the hosts Mike Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough spoke with Scott Todd on the subject. Brzezinski stated that it wasn’t that NBC shouldn’t have those on all aspects of the political spectrum on the show, but that having someone who was an active election denier may be harmful to the station.
“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,” he said. “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.”
The hiring of McDaniel also got called a potential “threat to democracy” by Nicole Wallace, the host of Deadline: White House. She said, “NBC News is, either wittingly or unwittingly, teaching election deniers that what they can do stretches well beyond appearing on our air and interviews to peddle lies about the sanctity and integrity of our elections.”
The first half-hour of Rachel Maddow’s show on NBC was also dedicated to speaking on the controversial hiring. She touched on her feelings about it and the problems she had with McDaniel calling press such as NBC “fake news”.
“We do not take it personally when we get attacked, when they say they want to put us on trial and execute us for treason,” she said, “and so 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,” she said of McDaniel. “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.”
With this, the release of McDaniel has been met with much praise, with journalists such as Maddow being happy with the network’s decision. “I think it is a show of strength and a show of respect for the people who work at this company and make us who we are,” Maddow said. “That leadership was willing to change on this, I’m grateful to them.”