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‘MSNBC’ Cancels Shows: Network Axes 3 Afternoon Programs, Ed Shultz To Depart Among Others

By Lindsay McCane
Published on: 02:18 PST, Aug 3, 2015

MSNBC has cancelled three shows.

According to the Associated Press, reported via Yahoo News, the network announced on Thursday, July 30 that they would be cancelling three afternoon programs to achieve a straight news focus during the daytime hours, and steer away from the more opinionated programming.

The cancelled shows include The Cycle(3:00 p.m.), a roundtable that featured hosts Ari Melber, Touré, Abby Huntsman and Krystal Ball; Now with Alex Wagner (4:00 p.m.); and The Ed Show( 5:00 p.m.) with Ed Schultz.

“[The shows were cancelled to] build a new daytime lineup with the best live, breaking news coverage on television,” MSNBC president Phil Griffin said in the memo, obtained by the Huffington Post.

Due to the change in lineup, several MSNBC personalities will be leaving the network. Ed Shultz, who joined the crew in 2009, will not be returning, along with Krystal Ball, Abby Huntsman and Touré. Melber is planning on staying with the network and will serve as the chief legal correspondent.

“[Wagner will] play a key role in our political coverage as we head into the 2016 election,” the memo read.

Chuck Todd, the host of Meet the Press, will now be hosting a daily politics show, likely to be called The Daily Rundown, that will take Shultz’s 5:00 p.m. time slot. Todd will also be anchoring Sunday morning’s State of the Union.

Mediaite first reported that there were some major changes coming to MSNBC last week. However, they were not confirmed until Griffin issued the memo.

“I know you read press reports last week speculating about these changes,” Griffin said. “I hope you can understand that we were not able to confirm at that point because we had not yet finalized many of the decisions I’m sharing with you today, and we hadn’t yet spoken directly with the people involved.”

The changes to the network come as NBC News chief Andrew Lack, who is overseeing both NBC News and MSNBC, is trying to change the daytime lineup from a liberal perspective to a more straight-forward news and politics source to help their declining ratings.

According to the memo, MSNBC will “unveil a 9 am to 5 pm schedule” in September “driven by dynamic coverage of breaking news events that are shaping the day.”

What do you think about MSNBC cancelling the three shows? Leave your comments below.

[Photo by Logan Mock-Bunting/Getty Images]

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