In addition to canceling Joy Reid‘s daytime show The Reid Report, which MSNBC sources confirmed to Mediaite earlier today, the network is also canceling Ronan Farrow’s show and moving Way Too Early’s Thomas Roberts back to a dayside role, anchoring a straight news show from 1-3 p.m. ET daily.
Neither Reid nor Farrow have been fired by the network. Reid will become MSNBC’s national correspondent, producing original reporting for on air and online programming. Farrow is expected to host a new series of primetime specials for MSNBC and will be featured as a special correspondent across the network’s schedule.
The change in daytime programming represents a conscious shift by the network away from more opinionated hosts and towards a more news-focused lineup. Following Morning Joe, José Díaz-Balart’s show will air for two hours starting at 9 a.m., followed by Tamron Hall at 11, Andrea Mitchell at 12 and then Roberts from 1-3 p.m. each day.
Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski will fill in for Roberts on Way Too Early until a more permanent replacement is found.
Earlier this month, Farrow’s show hit a new low in the 25-54 demo ratings with just 11,000 viewers. During the same hour, Fox led with 202K and CNN had 154K. Even Al Jazeera America topped MSNBC with 22K. While it has rated slightly better than Ronan Farrow Daily over the past year, The Reid Report has also struggled of late, routinely trailing CNN and Fox by large margins.
Back in October of last year, in a Mediaite exclusive, Joe Concha reported that MSNBC was looking to cancel Farrow’s show and shake-up its daytime schedule. A representative for the network shot down the suggestion at the time, saying in a statement, “No, we’re fully committed to Ronan.”
UPDATE — 6:03 p.m. ET: Farrow, for one, shrugged off the shake-up on Twitter:
Excited about new role – more to come soon.
— Ronan Farrow (@RonanFarrow) February 19, 2015
[Photo via screengrab]
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