The guy REALLY didn’t belong there…
He’s gay...
He’s been knocking the News channel’s franchise Donald Trump…
He’s gone….
To critics who accuse Fox News of being uniformly pro-Trump, the network often points to the blunt-truth reporting of Shepard Smith, its veteran chief news anchor, whose coverage of the Trump White House stood out on a channel known best for conservative opinion.
Starting now, Fox News will need to point to somebody else.
In an announcement that stunned colleagues, Mr. Smith concluded his Friday newscast by signing off from Fox News — for good. “Recently, I asked the company to allow me to leave,” Mr. Smith said calmly. “After requesting that I stay, they obliged.”
A member of the network’s founding staff in 1996, Mr. Smith became increasingly conspicuous at Fox News for his skepticism on President Trump. “Why is it lie after lie after lie?” Mr. Smith asked during a 2017 newscast; this summer, he deemed the president’s attacks on minority female lawmakers as “misleading and xenophobic.”
His pointed comments, closer in tone to that of CNN anchors like Anderson Cooper than of Fox News mainstays like Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson, irked Mr. Trump, who had taken to taunting Mr. Smith on Twitter as the network’s “lowest-rated anchor.” Other Fox News personalities were also unimpressed: Last month, Mr. Carlson openly mocked Mr. Smith on-air, a rare moment of intramural discord bursting into public view.
[Read about on-air sniping at Fox News.]
The internal tensions had frustrated Mr. Smith, 55, who was dismayed at the disconnect between some of the pro-Trump cheerleading in prime-time and the reporting produced by the network’s newsroom, according to two people close to the anchor who requested anonymity to share his private observations. Mr. Smith had been considering an exit from Fox News for several weeks, the people said.
On Friday, in public at least, all parties played down any difficulties….
image..nydailynews
There is already all sorts of speculation that Smith was “forced out” and so forth.
The problem is that the news division, of which Smith was one of the Stars, is reporting actual “news” that totally conflicts with the Trump propagandists who comprise the “entertainment “ lineup of the network.Presently, not only are the two diametrically opposed to each other, but now they are increasingly openly feuding on air.
An untenable situation.
Smiths departure is certainly going to be viewed as a victory for the “entertainment “ faction, particularly if he is replaced by a more pliable”news” person.
Great point Jack