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By Ewan Palmer
News Reporter
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MSNBC host Joy Reid, who spent years criticizing President Donald Trump, is the latest news anchor to experience a career setback since the Republican returned to office.
The liberal-leaning network is canceling The ReidOut and replacing it with a panel show hosted by Democratic strategist Symone Sanders-Townsend, writer and host Alicia Menendez and Michael Steele, the former chairman of the Republican National Committee, a source familiar with the situation told Newsweek.
Reid appeared to confirm that her show had been canceled on social media, writing on Bluesky in the early hours of Monday morning Eastern Time that she would present The ReidOut "one more time."
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Newsweek has contacted MSNBC and Reid for comment via email.
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Reid is not the only casualty at a left-leaning news network struggling in the ratings since Trump began his second term in January.
In January, CNN anchor Jim Acosta, who had gained a reputation for his antagonizing questions toward Trump during his first term, announced he was leaving the network after nearly 20 years. Acosta's decision came after CNN said it would move his 10 a.m. show to a midnight to 2 a.m. slot.
The shake-up at CNN is part of a larger reshuffling at the network after it laid off 6 percent of its workforce. But while the efforts to ramp up its digital strategies come amid a general decline in cable news viewership, it also comes at the beginning of a new Trump era.
John Pitney, a veteran political scientist and former Republican National Committee official, previously told Newsweek that while ratings could have been a factor in CNN moving Acosta's show, politics could also have been "part of the picture."
"Acosta is an aggressive interviewer, and executives might be thinking that his approach is unappealing to right-leaning viewers," Pitney said. "And there is Trump himself. He has not been shy about threatening the economic interests of news organizations that displease him."
A Vocal Trump Critic
There is no indication that Reid's highly critical views of Trump directly resulted in her show being canceled. The decision is part of a major overhaul overseen by the network's new president, Rebecca Kutler.
Danielle Vinson, a professor of politics and international affairs at Furman University in South Carolina, noted that MSNBC has seen a drop in viewership after November's election, with "Democrats deciding that for their own sanity they needed to dial back their news consumption."
The ReidOut suffered a major slump in ratings since the 2024 election. Nielsen Media Research revealed that Reid's show averaged around 759,000 viewers in early December—a 47 percent decline from the 1.4 million average it achieved in 2024 leading up to Election Day, Fox News reported.
On February 20, Reid's show was reported to have around 778,000 viewers, while Fox News' Laura Ingraham attracted an estimated 3.4 million in the same slot.
Reid has been a vocal Trump critic throughout his political career, attacking the president both on air and on social media.
In January, Reid called Trump an "insurrectionist" over his alleged role in the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, while describing his return to the White House as an eventual "violent transfer of power."
Reid posted a video on TikTok in July 2024 urging Democrats to support President Joe Biden's reelection campaign to keep "Hitler out of the White House."
'One of the Least Talented People in Television'
In December, Reid compared Trump to fictional mob boss Tony Soprano from the HBO series The Sopranos while condemning the Republican's foreign policy proposals. This included his 25 percent tariff threats on several countries and his suggestion that Canada could become the 51st state.
"He's not even president yet, and he's already spending his time sitting in his golden palace, Mar-a-Lago, muscling other countries like he's Tony Soprano with a social media site," Reid said.
Vinson dismissed suggestions that the cancellation of The ReidOut indicates how the liberal-leaning MSNBC news network may want to proceed now that Trump is back in office.
"They're replacing Reid with a trio that includes Michael Steele, who is increasingly, vocally and at times humorously anti-Trump. Most of the MSNBC evening lineup is unapologetically anti-Trump," Vinson told Newsweek. "With new leadership coming in at MSNBC, some changes were inevitable. I doubt that this signals a major change in how that network will cover politics."
Trump showed delight in the reports that Reid's MSNBC show had been canceled. The president called Reid "one of the least talented people in television" and a "mentally obnoxious racist" in a post on Truth Social.
"This whole corrupt operation is nothing more than an illegal arm of the Democrat Party," Trump added. "They should be forced to pay vast sums of money for the damage they've done to our country. Fake News is an UNPARDONABLE SIN!"
The final episode of TheReidOut could take place as soon as Monday night.
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