Mediaite’s Most Influential in News Media 2024
35. Ari Melber
Ari Melber finishes 2024 at the helm of MSNBC’s The Beat for a seventh year. It’s not just generally strong ratings that Melber has to crow about: The Beat has caught fire on YouTube, where Melber has amassed more than 1.5 billion views on the platform. It’s a good omen for the host, who has managed to attract a younger audience in an industry where the average viewer is old and getting older. What makes The Beat unique is Melber’s willingness to welcome opposing viewpoints – like Trump world figures such as Peter Navarro and Corey Lewandowski, who Melber had on his show for fascinating if heated interviews. In another notably tense showdown, Melber challenged RFK Jr. on Trump threatening to pardon Jan. 6 rioters. The Beat dominated rival CNN during the 6 p.m. ET hour, often notching nearly 2 million viewers and even beat the rest of MSNBC on occasion – no easy feat for an early evening program. In a year when Trump’s legal issues were a major story, MSNBC’s viewers turned to Melber, who also serves as the network’s chief legal analyst, for guidance. And with a more understated and less partisan demeanor than many of his MSNBC colleagues, one thing most on either of the aisle can agree on is that Melber is a smart and analytical host. Melber fits the mold for a network that welcomes wonkery, but with a splash of rap and a dash of culture, he’s perfected the recipe both on the air and online.
34. Steve Bannon
The greatest media checks on Trump 2.0 will likely not come from the president-elect’s left, but rather his right. And the man who helped build Trump 1.0 has established himself as one of the few with the ability and willingness to take Trump on for not being conservative enough. Already, Steve Bannon has made clear that the defeat of Matt Gaetz’s attorney general bid was a shot to the solar plexus — and warned Trump that he should not have waved the white flag. Should his frequent guest Kash Patel find himself in deep water during his confirmation fight to become FBI director, Bannon’s sure to raise hell. (Pity the moderate Republican who finds himself on the business end of a Bannon rant.) And no foe is too powerful for Bannon to not only challenge, but to rattle. You can be sure the folks at 1211 Avenue of the Americas pay heed to Bannon’s frequent attacks on Rupert Murdoch. Bannon’s War Room is a daily must-listen for MAGA diehards and those who want to understand them. What you hear on War Room today you’re very likely to read in a Truth Social post tomorrow. And the guests you see on War Room — like Patel, former National Security Advisor Mike Flynn, and incoming White House trade advisor Peter Navarro — are far more likely to influence public policy than the type of backbench Democrat you often see on MSNBC. The greatest testament to how big of a year Steve Bannon had? The fact that he made such an impact while spending a third of it behind bars. Just imagine how much influence he will have with a full 12 months of freedom and unfettered access to his audience.
33. Jessica Tarlov
There are two rotating liberal co-hosts on Fox News show The Five, but only Jessica Tarlov is on this list. Unlike the amiable Harold Ford Jr., who regularly seeks common ground with his four conservative co-hosts, Tarlov is always ready for a one-on-four verbal brawl against Greg Gutfeld, Dana Perino, Jeanine Pirro, and Jesse Watters. Armed with well-researched talking points and a punchy attitude, Tarlov provides Fox News viewers information they are unlikely to get elsewhere in the channel’s lineup. And it works, ratings-wise, as the show is now the most-watched program on all of cable news. Tarlov also waded into podcasting, launching Raging Moderates, a new show with Scott Galloway that’s already built up a sturdy audience. It was a busy year for Tarlov off the air as well. As she did in 2021, she took maternity leave this year to care for her newborn daughter. Less happily, she was sued for defamation over comments she made on air, but ultimately prevailed when a judge dismissed the lawsuit and ordered the plaintiff to pay Tarlov’s legal expenses. Fox News backed its employee and took a victory lap after the dismissal, blasting the “meritless allegations” against her. It’s not easy defending the left on Fox News, particularly in a panel format, but there is no one better suited for the job than the likeable but tough Tarlov.
32. Debra OConnell
In February, the Walt Disney Company chose a veteran executive to helm a new division merging ABC with its local affiliates – mirroring a similar move made by CBS in 2023. The new job made Debra OConnell one of the most powerful leaders in the news business; her purview includes marquee franchises like World News Tonight and Good Morning America, ABC News Live and beyond. OConnell is well-respected by the rank and file at ABC and among the bosses – something the news division has been missing for years. In OConnell’s first year in the new role, the network enjoyed a huge ratings win: ABC News hosted the first and only debate between Harris and Trump, and the moderators’ aggressive fact-checking of the former president made for one of the biggest television spectacles of the year. A whopping 70 million people tuned in to the debate, which drew predictable complaints from Trump’s supporters but high marks from the rest of the industry. Now anti-Trump resistance folks are furious after ABC agreed to apologize to Trump and pay $15 million to settle a defamation suit brought over George Stephanopoulos’s comments in an interview about Trump and his legal troubles. Time will tell how ABC will navigate the Trump era that has news leaders on edge like never before. With Almin Karamehmedovic – a well-regarded and experienced journalist – named president of ABC News in August of this year, expect 2025 to be a major year for OConnell and the iconic broadcast network.
31. Ezra Klein
Ezra Klein’s 2024 was a masterclass in shaking up the political establishment while keeping a firm grip on the intellectual pulse of the nation. As both a New York Times columnist and host of The Ezra Klein Show, his in-depth dissections of America’s political fractures were required listening and reading for liberals anxious to navigate the chaos. Klein threw a grenade into the Democratic Party’s early-year plans with his provocative February column arguing that Biden should step aside. The suggestion, radical yet reasoned, reverberated through op-eds and green rooms alike. Coupled with sharp follow-ups on his podcast, Klein became a central player in the conversation that culminated in Biden leaving the ticket and Harris securing the nomination. At the Democratic National Convention, Klein’s influence was palpable. He didn’t just analyze the party’s inflection point — he disrupted its narrative, coaxing uneasy questions about leadership, messaging, and the party’s identity into the open. Post-election, Klein’s sharp pen didn’t pause. Unafraid to puncture his own party’s comfort zones, he zeroed in on rising crime, border dysfunction, and economic stagnation in America’s cities as he explained Harris’s stunning defeat and challenged Democrats to trade platitudes for pragmatism. In an election year awash with noise, Klein stood out by asking the tough questions and refusing easy answers. His brand of unapologetically cerebral commentary reminded America that influence isn’t about volume — it’s about the ideas that linger after the shouting stops.
30. Andrew Ross Sorkin
Andrew Ross Sorkin has helped to turn CNBC’s Squawk Box into perhaps the best morning news show on television. Alongside Joe Kernen and Becky Quick, the program pairs news on everything from business and markets to politics and tech with interviews with the biggest names in those industries – whether it’s Mark Cuban and Bill Ackman in studio weighing in on the 2024 race or French President Emmanual Macron talking AI in the Élysée Palace. Sorkin’s clashes with Kernen over the latest Trump firestorm have become must-watch television, but what sets Sorkin apart in an industry of partisans is the fact that his commentary so often plays it straight. Amid mainstream media groupthink about Elon Musk’s stewardship of X, for example, Sorkin presented the bull case in an interview with Mediaite for the social media platform leveraging its AI technology to become a behemoth. Sorkin’s words carry weight thanks to his cred as not just the co-host of Squawk Box but, maybe even more importantly, his gig at The New York Times, where he serves as founder and editor at large of DealBook, the paper’s flagship business newsletter. The DealBook Summit, the annual conference hosted by Sorkin, was a mighty success this year, featuring news-making interviews with the likes of Alex Cooper and Jeff Bezos. With tech titans and CEOs factoring into a presidential election awash with more cash and commentary than ever before, Sorkin was a central player guiding Americans through the madness.
29. Margaret Brennan
Michele Crowe/CBS
Margaret Brennan isn’t just the host of top-rated Face The Nation, CBS News’s Sunday politics program. She has also figured out how to create buzz with her interviews, often by dissecting truth from lies in confrontations with lawmakers and presidential candidates alike. This year, Face The Nation held steady as the top weekend news program, averaging 2.8 million total viewers. For a show on CBS News, which typically isn’t competitive in the ratings, ending the year as the number one Sunday news show over ABC, NBC, CNN, and Fox is a tremendous feat. It’s not hard to see why: Brennan has a reputation for incisive pushback and her well-researched style makes Face The Nation a must-watch for anyone interested in hearing from leaders, activists, and politicians every Sunday. Throughout the 2024 election cycle, Brennan covered the major campaign moments and moderated the network’s vice presidential debate between JD Vance and Tim Walz. But there is also a reason that her Sunday morning interviews tend to be covered by Mediaite more than the others – it’s because she makes news.
28. Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan
Few if any reporters are as synonymous with Trump as Maggie Haberman, the relentless New York Times journalist who has covered his political career as it rocketed from Trump Tower to the White House, then to Mar-a-Lago, and now back to Washington.
Relentless is probably an understatement. Haberman is known for her blizzard of bylines; in 2024 she regularly boasted multiple stories per day. She continues to provide analysis for CNN, where her Trump insights are always a must-watch.
And as much as Trump loves to bash her, that she remains the most plugged-in reporter covering Trump-world proves he doesn’t really mean it. In 2022 she was joined at the Times by Jonathan Swan, the Aussie journalist who impressed with his own scoops at Axios, as well as an iconic interview with Trump. Together, Swan and Haberman dominate the Trump beat, their bylines as regular a sight on the front page of the Times as Trump’s own mug.
What’s more, the incredibly well-sourced pair have a deal for a book about the president-elect expected to release in 2025. With Trump back in the White House, expect to continue reading these two – and hearing the president’s complaints about their spot-on coverage – for years to come.
27. Tucker Carlson
AP Photo/Evan Vucci
2024 marked Tucker Carlson’s first full year in the wilderness of independent media. Since his firing from Fox News in the wake of the bombshell Dominion settlement, Carlson found himself without a cable news home for the first time.
The timing may have been fortuitous – not only had Carlson achieved an unprecedented level of fame and audience from his perch as the top-rated host on Fox News, but in an era where independent media is in many ways supplanting the traditional press, 2024 was fertile ground for his streaming operation, which he has grown into a sizable business.
On top of that, he barreled across the nation for a live events tour that saw everyone from Russell Brand to Trump himself join Carlson on stage for interviews that virtually always made headlines.
Without question, Carlson retained his knack for generating controversy: his biggest moment of the year was an interview with Russian president Vladimir Putin, a sit-down that was fascinating even as it sparked accusations that the American pundit acted as a stooge for Russia (it didn’t help that Carlson paired the interview with a bizarrely fawning trip to a Russian supermarket, where he marveled at the price of groceries).
Still, his influence in a year where Trump stormed back to the White House was undeniable. Carlson continues to throw around his weight as a voice in Trump’s ear, advocating not only for the selection of JD Vance as running mate but also killing Mike Pompeo’s shot at serving as Defense Secretary, as reported by The Wall Street Journal. Meanwhile, his interviews and commentary racked up millions of views on X, and Carlson’s unscripted speech at the RNC rocked the arena and once again sparked speculation that he has plans for a run for political office (speculation he always denies.) In Trump’s America, Tucker Carlson in public office is less outlandish than it’s ever been.
26. Stephen A. Smith
Stephen A. Smith enjoyed another year as the driving force behind the no. 1 show on daytime sports TV. That longevity was made even more impressive by the news that Skip Bayless – his former First Take colleague – ended his seven-year run at Fox Sports’s rival debate show Undisputed. Away from First Take, The Stephen A. Smith Show offered compelling interviews from figures in sports, entertainment, and politics. Smith has long floated the idea of a pivot into politics, and he recently displayed what he’s capable of in front of a national prime time audience. In a fiery debate with Fox News’s Sean Hannity, the quick-witted Smith showed the skills he’s honed on the sports desk translate seamlessly into cable news. Smith has become one of the most sought-after guests to opine – and sometimes shout – about a variety of topics, from sports to politics to culture. Although he’s already cultivated his own sizable audience, it’s not unreasonable to say that the Stephen A. Smith brand is just getting started.