NBCUniversal News Group chairman Cesar Conde, responsible for outlets including MSNBC, CNBC, and Telemundo, reportedly wants his news operations to provide a “big tent.” However, the regression of MSNBC into “a kind of televised safe space” after Donald Trump’s election in 2016 has dragged down the rest of NBC with it, The New York Times reports, with the former president and conservatives in general increasingly regarding it as a partisan “fake news” operation.
“Our strategy is built on our distinct, complementary brands including NBC News, CNBC, NBC News Now, MSNBC and Telemundo,” NBCUniversal News Group claimed in a statement to the Times. “That has driven our performance as the nation’s leading news organization with the largest reach.”
But the Times notes the decision to hire Jen Psaki, Joe Biden’s former press secretary, and another Biden aide, Symone D. Sanders, “straight from the White House” showed MSNBC was only doubling down on its partisan bias. The negotiations to hire Psaki, in particular, caused conflict of interest concerns among NBC News staffers, with the network’s then-co-chief White House correspondent asking the then-Biden official how it could be “ethical to have these conversations with media outlets while you continue to have a job standing behind that podium?”
BALANCE FAIL.
Bias at MSNBC became so bad that NBC parent company Comcast “intervened in MSNBC’s coverage following negative remarks about Israel” following the Hamas attack on the country on October 7, 2023. It was around this time that far-left British anchor Mehdi Hassan exited the network.
However, virulently anti-Trump shows have attracted a considerable audience of Democratic hardliners, allowing them to derail Conde’s efforts to restore some semblance of balance. On-air rebellions by the likes of Rachel Maddow over the hiring of Ronna McDaniel, considered a Republican-in-name-only by most Trump supporters, saw her deal canceled.
The Biden regime has also been directly leaning on NBC to remain biased, with officials “perturbed about the McDaniel hire,” according to the Times. The newspaper also reports Biden aides are lobbying the Nightly News, “whose huge audience is of critical political importance to the [Biden] campaign,” to stop “taking it easy on Mr. Trump and treating Mr. Biden too harshly.”