Joy Reid on her ouster from MSNBC: ‘In this moment, not being a part of corporate media is a gift’ | US news

Pleasure Reid hosted the 7pm hour on MSNBC for practically 5 years, offering a every day dose of progressive power and verve that led into the community’s primetime programming. Then, in late February, Reid was immediately pressured out, and her present, The ReidOut, was cancelled as a part of a broader programming shakeup on the community. Reid has since launched her personal streaming present, The Pleasure Reid Present, and has a couple of issues to say in regards to the mainstream media she was as soon as a part of.Now that it’s been eight months because you have been abruptly fired by MSNBC, how do you view your departure? I nonetheless miss my staff. I really like my little ReidOut staff. We had an amazing household. We had a tremendous, superb time. And I really like the folks that I labored with, however I general see my departure as a blessing, to be sincere. I feel on this second, not being part of company media is definitely a present. As a result of from now, on the surface trying in, I don’t know that I might stay with the form of restrictions that folks in company media are dealing with. So I feel – it was a blessing.What sort of restrictions are you referring to?It’s that these firms are all doing enterprise with the administration. All of them have enterprise earlier than the FCC [Federal Communications Commission], and due to this fact they will make their content material and the journalism being executed at these establishments – they’re going to make it bow to the larger company want.In different phrases, Comcast is a donor to the Epstein ballroom. They’re going to provide cash to Donald Trump. Everyone seems to be paying him. ABC paid him off, CBS paid him off, Comcast – they’re all bowing to his will or writing him a examine. And due to this fact, everybody who works in these organizations must be aware that in the event that they displease Donald Trump, if he notices their journalism and it makes him mad, he might have his Challenge 2025-author FCC chair [Brendan Carr] punish them.If they’ve an excessive amount of range, if they’ve too many Black individuals on air, in the event that they rent too many minorities, too many homosexual individuals, too many ladies, in the event that they’re too visibly various, he might have his FCC punish them.And I’m taking a look at every of those entities. I’m taking a look at CBS being warped by being owned by a Trump fan who’s gobbling up the media, he and his dad [David and Larry Ellison], our new Murdochs, consuming up the media.Larry Ellison on the White Home on 21 January 2025. {Photograph}: Aaron Schwartz/CNP/Dpa Image Alliance/AlamyAnd you’ll be able to see the outcomes at CBS Information: mass firings at Paramount CBS. You possibly can already see CBS Information working tales below Bari Weiss that they’d by no means, by no means have run, questioning whether or not the Gaza dying rely was actual or whether or not individuals have been dying of pure causes. The issues which are occurring at CBS – I can nearly really feel the visceral ache that CBS Information staff have gotten to be feeling having this Substacker be their boss when they’re longtime, skilled journalists having to reply to a rightwing Substacker. And a rightwing ombudsman.You realize, I’m watching ABC and also you’re listening to these tales of even the View being pressured: “Not a lot anti-Trumpism, please.” They’re there to touch upon the information of the day, however, you recognize, curtail that. I’m listening to from associates that also work at MS NOW [MSNBC’s new name], no matter its new identify is, having to work in a spot that fired Matt Dowd for saying a completely true and inoffensive truth and now having to comprehend that he was dismissed summarily for saying a real factor about Charlie Kirk, and every of them might be as effectively. And figuring out the pressures which are on the individuals there about what they’ll and can’t say, and that these pressures are being – they’re coming as Comcast has enterprise earlier than the administration, as ABC Disney does, as CBS Paramount does.It appeared notable that prime executives at Comcast, MSNBC’s proprietor, issued a memo denouncing Dowd’s feedback about Kirk. [Dowd had said, after the shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, that “hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which then lead to hateful actions”.]The issues I hear simply internally of individuals simply feeling much less freedom to do the journalism they know that they’re able to. I imply, look, Rachel Maddow continues to be Rachel Maddow-ing. You realize what I imply? Lawrence O’Donnell continues to be Lawrence O’Donnell-ing. The nice journalists at MSNBC are nonetheless doing the good stuff they’ve executed, and so they’re nonetheless actually powerful on the administration. They’re nonetheless holding to their manufacturers and to their integrity. So I’m not saying everyone seems to be being suppressed. Clearly the voices are getting out. Chris Hayes continues to be Chris Hayes-ing. You realize what I imply? I nonetheless see and listen to the clips of individuals nonetheless doing the work. However the issue is everybody on this enterprise proper now, for those who work for a company media entity, you recognize over your shoulder stands Donald Trump and Brendan Carr.Matthew Dowd throughout an ABC election particular on 3 March 2020. {Photograph}: Lorenzo Bevilaqua/ABC through Getty ImagesEveryone is aware of that, whether or not you’re in cable or broadcast. Brendan Carr can’t regulate cable information, however he can regulate Comcast. He can regulate your boss’s boss. And so I really feel like I personally am grateful to not must get up each morning worrying about what punishment Brendan Carr would possibly mete out to my group and my firm based mostly on the journalism I do on my little present. I don’t wish to get up and take into consideration that. I don’t wish to take into consideration, you recognize, whether or not or not Donald Trump tweeting at me in some way impacts my employees or impacts my govt producer or might get them in bother. I’m grateful to not have to consider that. [An MSNBC spokesperson said in response that “viewers who watch MSNBC any day of the week know that the values and tone of our coverage have not changed”.]While you have been at MSNBC, did you are feeling such as you had the flexibility to push again on a few of your bigger protection considerations on the community, or did you are feeling you needed to keep in your lane?I just about simply targeted on my present. I wasn’t there to be a critic of the best way the community operated. Two ways in which I did have some frustration was the period of time we spent going stay to Trump – once I was on my weekend present actually. This was an enormous rigidity, and I feel this was a rigidity that’s regular. I didn’t really feel like each time Donald Trump belched we needed to go stay to him. And look, we had a distinction of opinion. I didn’t wish to go stay to him, as an illustration, when he was on the Nationwide Cathedral, however the Girls’s March was occurring. And we have now that rigidity. And in order that’s regular stuff that occurs inside a community.I undoubtedly really feel like on the protection of Gaza, I had super frustration that I felt prefer it was very troublesome for us to get the opposite aspect of the story. And that wasn’t due to our community, that was due to the federal government of Israel not permitting journalists into Gaza and never permitting any goal reporting with no minder. And in order that wasn’t my frustration with my community, that was a frustration with a overseas authorities that was attempting to form protection of a genocide. However internally, I’ll say, you can really feel that protection of the genocide as a genocide was undesirable and that the folks that I labored for have been probably not enthusiastic, I’ll say, in regards to the protection of that genocide as a genocide. That was not wished. And now that I’ve left, I really feel like that undoubtedly contributed to my departure. As a result of I feel if you see a genocide occurring, you could have an obligation as a journalist to cowl it as what it’s.The place did you draw the road if you felt it was price calling out your community on air and probably danger your job?Particularly on the Gaza situation, I felt like: “What was the purpose of getting the platform if I couldn’t converse out towards a genocide?” On that one, I knew that it was dangerous, and I had individuals always telling me: “Please cease speaking about Gaza. You’re going to get fired.” I had individuals, even together with my circle of relatives, who have been apprehensive about me, however to be sincere with you, I by no means dreamed in one million years that they’d lay off my complete employees. Usually they simply lay off the host or cancel the present, after which they make the host a contributor.Palestinian households returning to Jabalia within the northern Gaza Strip are persevering with their lives with restricted means amidst buildings decreased to rubble by assaults on 6 November 2025. {Photograph}: Omar Ashtawy/APAImages through ShutterstockI assume what pushed Rachel [Maddow, who called the cancellation a “bad mistake”] to talk out in an extremely valiant manner, and I really like and adore her, by the best way – I feel she is so courageous and such an amazing journalist – however I feel what pushed her was what enraged all of us, which is that they didn’t simply cancel my present. You possibly can cancel my present. I don’t personal Comcast. I don’t personal MSNBC. They laid off our complete staffs. Like, that’s not regular. And I feel for those who return and take heed to her rant, it wasn’t nearly me, it was about these unimaginable journalists, together with on her personal employees, on all of our staffs. That isn’t the best way MSNBC has ever operated. … These should not people who find themselves making tens of millions of {dollars} a yr. These are individuals with mortgages and lease to pay and households and youngsters. And I used to be shocked that that occurred to my staff. Would I’ve felt otherwise if I believed my employees was in jeopardy? Yeah, I’d have been extra circumspect, however I nonetheless really feel like I’d have lined Gaza the best way I did, truthfully. I don’t remorse that in any respect, as a result of I feel that’s our obligation as journalists. I felt like I needed to do it, however I’d have had at the back of my thoughts my employees was in jeopardy. I by no means thought that. [The vast majority of Reid’s staffers were ultimately able to get other jobs at the network.]Had been you heartened that a few of your former colleagues in MSNBC – Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O’Donnell and Stephanie Ruhle – known as out Comcast for his or her donation to the East Wing ballroom challenge?Completely. And they’re the perfect of individuals. I’m so heartened by it, and sure, I feel it’s courageous, I feel it’s good, and I feel they needed to do it. … I really feel like we have now to have some integrity in journalism. Had they not stated something about Comcast giving to this ballroom, I feel they wouldn’t have been capable of sleep at evening. So I’m glad they did it.And I assume you’d have executed it additionally, for those who have been nonetheless on?One hundred percent. Oh, a thousand p.c. If I used to be nonetheless there, a thousand p.c.Have you ever discovered that your cable information viewers has moved with you to your streaming present?Completely, yeah. Individuals who loved me, individuals will nonetheless discover me on Substack. They’re nonetheless gonna discover me on my YouTube present, on The Pleasure Reid Present. They’ll nonetheless discover me on my TikTok, on my [Instagram]. It’s simply that it fragments the viewers as a result of they’re not all having to go to MSNBC. I’ve discovered that individuals are discovering me the place they’re comfy and the mediums wherein they’re comfy. … It’s only a matter of you understanding on this enterprise that you’re your model and that your organization shouldn’t be your model.And also you’ve discovered it to be a great enterprise to this point?Yeah, and I used to be not a YouTube individual, so I’m very new to it. Thank god we have now nice companions. … So I’ve discovered a gentle touchdown, and I’m grateful for the viewers, and I’m very grateful to the companions that we have now. And we’re constructing a enterprise. Now it’s completely different, proper? My husband and I’ve had a manufacturing firm for a lot of, a few years, however we haven’t needed to make it our main focus as a result of we’ve at all times been doing different issues. However now we’re specializing in it full-time and we’re leaning into our entrepreneurial period. My husband’s been at it quite a bit longer as a result of he was working that aspect of the enterprise for some time. … Now we’re engaged on our personal and I’m loving it. I’m loving the independence.Is there something you miss about having a nightly cable information present?I’m realizing it’s an unimaginable blessing to have 15 staffers, 15 producers to make your TV. I was a reserving producer, I was a producer-producer, a information producer, and I’m a reserving producer and a information producer once more. It’s so far more work. I’m so blessed with our staff, however our staff are part-timers. We don’t have a full-time employees. Our full-time employees is my husband, myself. We employed our daughter to work for us. However we’re a tiny, tiny, tiny staff, so it’s a lot more durable to do issues with far fewer individuals.Final week, CBS Information gutted their race and tradition unit. NBC Information additionally not too long ago made cuts affecting its groups devoted to protecting Black, Asian American, Latino and LGBTQ+ communities. Do you assume we’re seeing an intentional unwinding of a few of the strikes that have been made by media firms in response to the occasions of 2020 and the backlash to George Floyd’s killing?It wasn’t due to George Floyd. It was as a result of Barack Obama bought elected. And immediately these firms have been actually being pushed by the [National Association of Black Journalists] and [National Association of Hispanic Journalists] and in addition by the LGBTQ organizations that work with the media to say,: “Hey, we want illustration. You could have a Black president. You want extra voices, proper?” And so these initiatives actually have been born across the Obama administration. I feel the demise of them within the wake of this backlash towards the George Floyd DEI revolution is a part of the nationwide backlash. There’s only a basic backlash amongst conservatives towards any range initiatives and even any range, interval, within the nation. …It feels just like the media is capitulating to that and that they’re aligning their very own insurance policies with the administration self-protectively, as a result of they don’t wish to be punished. But in addition I feel partly as a result of in some methods these main media firms, which once more should not run by liberals, they’re run by people who find themselves perhaps libertarian to considerably conservative, they’ve been relieved of the burden of getting to do range. In order that they don’t wish to do it. In case you did it reluctantly anyway, I don’t assume it’s actually bothering you to eliminate it.