NBC’s Lester Holt is out at Nightly News, the flagship show he has hosted for nearly a decade.
Holt, 65, announced he is stepping down in a memo sent to staffers Monday, ten years after he stepped in to replace longtime fixture Brian Williams on a full-time basis.Pause
The veteran anchor will now only man his usual spot on Dateline, NBC News’ Executive Vice President of Programming Janelle Rodriguez said in a statement.
NBC – whose asset MSNBC just cancelled Joy Reid’s show The ReidOut – have yet to announce a replacement.
‘[Holt] will continue at the helm of Nightly until early summer,’ Rodriguez said, revealing how the anchor will then devote ‘his energy to the rapidly-expanding powerhouse that is Dateline.’
Holt – previously the host of the show’s weekend edition – began hosting Nightly News on weekdays in June of 2015, after a scandal surrounding reporting from the Iraq War upended Williams’ career.
He has since told staffers his time on the show was an ‘amazing ride’ – doing so in a letter sent to Nightly and Dateline staffers Monday morning.
The principal anchor of ‘Dateline’ since September 2011 did not mention the show’s waning ratings, which are down year-over-year.
Instead, he expressed excitement about ‘continuing as anchor of “Dateline NBC” for the first time ‘in a full time capacity’.
NBC’s Lester Holt is out at Nightly News, the flagship show he has hosted for nearly a decade
Pictured, an excerpt from the Monday memo that Holt sent to his Nightly News and Dateline staff
‘I will be expanding my footprint on the broadcast and crafting ‘Dateline ‘hours on subjects I care deeply about,’ the anchor added, in a memo since re-shared by the company.
‘I am thrilled to be able to work more closely with my enormously talented friends at Dateline as the broadcast continues to grow and attract new viewers.’
Dateline is currently the 14th most popular show on NBC and is viewed by more than 2.3million people, but like most legacy media broadcasts as of late, is down drastically in terms of viewership when compared with years prior.
Just two years ago, the magazine-style program that’s regularly compared to CBS’s 60 Minutes or the PBS NewsHour had an average audience of more than 4million.
NBC Nightly News – currently behind evening news frontrunner ABC World News Tonight – is averaging 6.742 million total viewers, down one percent from this time last year.
The statistic, moreover, was recorded following some gains from the long-running program – which over the summer was subject to some double digit dips in total audience and in the hallowed 25-to-54-year-old demographic.
Back in July, the show was down 17 percent in total audience from the quarter before and 27 percent in the demographic most valued by advertisers, but has since managed to stop the bleeding.
However, a change in format already spawned a ratings crisis over at rival CBS – and Holt, for many viewers at home, has become a fixture.
Holt, 65, announced he is stepping down in a memo sent to staffers Monday, ten years after he stepped in to replace longtime fixture Brian Williams on a full-time basis
NBC – whose asset MSNBC just cancelled Joy Reid’s show The ReidOut – have yet to announce a replacement
A change in format already spawned a ratings crisis over at rival CBS. Pictured, Maurice DuBois and John Dickerson at the helm of a more magazine-style experiment since branded a failure
Asked about Nightly News’ future during an interview with Esquire in late 2023, the anchor conceded: ‘Yes, audiences are migrating. [But] how people consume us, that’s going to continue to change.
‘I have no idea how in seventy-five years,’ he added, after earning recognition stints on Today and MSNBC before that.
‘But Nightly News will exist.’
Meanwhile, still sitting in the wings is Senior National Correspondent Tom Llamas, whom for years now has been speculated to be Holt’s likely successor.
In 2021, insiders told Page Six how Llamas was ‘clearly being groomed for a big role’, and sources told the Ankler in November how higher-ups at the network would be happy to replace Holt with Llamas due to the latter’s comparatively modest salary of $2.5million.
It is unclear how much Holt was paid for Nightly News.
Holt’s contract expires this year, and Llamas has experience as an Evening News anchor thanks to time as a weekend host for ABC’s still-successful World News Tonight.
Holt scored the job thanks experience garnered under a similar role supplementing Williams, who himself was a figure once synonymous with American news.
A decade later, it seems a changing of the guard is in store, at a time where networks like CBS, MSNBC, and CNN are implementing change to address shifting consumer habits – and, perhaps, a new presidency.
Meanwhile, still sitting in the wings is Senior National Correspondent Tom Llamas, whom for years now has been speculated to be Holt’s likely successor. He also has evening news experience, once anchoring for ABC’s World News Tonight
In 2021, insiders told Page Six how Hamas was ‘clearly being groomed for a big role’, and sources told the Ankler in November how higher-ups at the network would be happy to replace Holt with Llamas due to the latter’s comparatively modest salary
‘Everything about our country has changed, except the language used to describe it,’ he wrote, after making a rare appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers after Trump’s win in November.
‘The problem, of course, is that this language is lazy, numbing and normalizing in a time of urgency and exigency,’ he went on, at this point offering his piece’s de facto mission statement.
‘It’s actually insulting, and a gross disservice to those watching and listening – because it doesn’t match what they just saw or heard for themselves.’
‘It was crushing to watch so many working journalists attempt to generate the words to accurately describe a visibly struggling and diminished president, seemingly unable to complete a sentence or a thought in his disastrous and final debate.’
Not mentioning any names, the man who for years worked with the likes of Rachel Maddow, Joe Scarborough, and Mika Brzezinski went on to offer one last parting shot at those who refused to face the truth.
‘Say it with me: It is perhaps the ultimate irony that the electoral collapse of the Democratic Party in 2024 was triggered in large part by the man who ran to save the country and democracy – the same man who then tried to stay too long at the fair.
‘There, I said it,’ he added as sort of signoff. ‘Now someone please say it into a microphone. You can do it.’
Holt scored the job thanks experience garnered under a similar role supplementing Williams, who himself was a figure once synonymous with American news, before a scandal surrounding his reporting from the Iraq War upended his 11-year stint
For his final sign-off, the figure once synonymous with American airwaves told colleagues that ‘following much reflection,’ he was leaving the company.
‘This is the end of a chapter and the beginning of another,’ Williams upon being succeeded by Holt, after joining NBC News in 1993.
‘There are many things I want to do, and I’ll pop up again somewhere,’ he said, before fading into relative obscurity.
A few years before, in 2015, a scandal saw him thrust from the seat he assumed from the legendary Tom Brokaw in 2004, after he was caught lying about a wartime story.
Developing story, check back for updates.
