After just 18 months on air, CNN This Morning has been canceled due to poor ratings and a series of scandals.
According to Page Six, the program, which aimed to provide viewers with accurate and contextualized news stories across America, will be replaced with a shortened program and a new anchor. This change comes on the heels of the show’s tumultuous start, which included the firing of host Don Lemon and the departure of co-host Kaitlan Collins to her own show.
The firing of Lemon in December 2022 was a dramatic and controversial event. Sources told the New York Post that Lemon had been screaming at Collins on air and had reduced her to tears, leading to her running off the set. The tension between the two hosts had been brewing for some time, and Collins eventually left the show in Spring 2023 to take over Chris Cuomo’s vacant 9 pm timeslot.
With Collins gone, Lemon’s co-host Poppy Harlow was left as the only original member of the trio. However, now she and anchor Phil Mattingly will also be coming off the air, according to Page Six. This latest shake-up comes amid thousands of viewers abandoning CNN, which has seen a 61 percent drop in primetime views compared to March 2022. CNN’s attempted turnaround under recently departed CEO Chris Licht does not seem to have been successful.
Lemon’s firing in April 2023 after 17 years with the network was another scandalous event, with the host taking to Twitter to express his shock and disappointment at not being told directly. However, CNN’s communications team refuted this claim, calling his tweet “inaccurate.”
This was not the first time Lemon’s controversial comments had caused a stir. In February 2023, he sparked accusations of sexism when discussing presidential candidate Nikki Haley’s age, saying that a woman’s prime is “in their 20s and 30s and maybe 40s.”
In September 2023, Lemon was once again at the center of controversy when he asked Republican panelist SE Cupp if she was suffering from “mommy brain” after she stumbled over her words. Cupp appeared taken aback by the question, and Lemon’s comments were criticized as sexist and demeaning.
During its debut week in November 2022, CNN This Morning attracted less than 390,000 viewers, despite heavy promotion by the network. This paled in comparison to competing morning shows, such as MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” with 793,000 viewers, and FOX’s “FOX and Friends” with 1.5 million viewers. Licht, who reportedly invested a lot of time and resources into the launch of the show, was replaced by former BBC boss Mark Thompson in August 2023.
With the cancellation of CNN This Morning, it remains to be seen what changes Thompson will bring to the network. However, the recent scandals and poor ratings suggest that CNN may be in need of a major overhaul in order to compete with its rivals.
As for Lemon, Collins, and Harlow, it is unclear what their next steps will be, but it is likely that they will continue to be a part of the ever-shifting landscape of cable news.
