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Don Lemon attends the sixteenth annual CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute on the American Museum of Pure Historical past on Dec. 11, 2022, in New York Metropolis.
Mike Coppola/Getty Pictures for CNN
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Mike Coppola/Getty Pictures for CNN
Don Lemon attends the sixteenth annual CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute on the American Museum of Pure Historical past on Dec. 11, 2022, in New York Metropolis.
Mike Coppola/Getty Pictures for CNN
Information anchor Don Lemon is out at CNN, the cable community introduced Monday.
“Don will ceaselessly be part of the CNN household, and we thank him for his contributions over the previous 17 years,” the information outlet said in a tweet. “We want him properly and will probably be cheering him on in his future endeavors.”
In a statement posted to his Twitter account, Lemon confirmed his ouster, saying his agent instructed him Monday morning that he had been terminated by CNN.
“I’m shocked. After 17 years at CNN, I’d have thought that somebody in administration would have had the decency to inform me instantly,” Lemon mentioned.
“At no time was I ever given any indication that I’d not be capable of proceed to do the work I’ve liked on the community. It’s clear that there are some bigger points at play.”
CNN called Lemon’s characterization about his firing “inaccurate” and mentioned he was given an opportunity to satisfy with administration.
The information of Lemon’s departure got here shortly after an announcement by Fox Information that it had parted methods with common and controversial host Tucker Carlson.
Lemon had lately returned to the air after taking day off following sexist and ageist remarks he made on CNN about Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley.
Throughout an episode of CNN This Morning in February, Lemon mentioned the 51-year-old Haley wasn’t “in her prime” and urged a girl is “thought-about to be in her prime in her 20s and 30s and perhaps 40s.”
Lemon later apologized, saying at an editorial assembly with CNN colleagues that he understood “why folks discovered it fully misguided.”
After Chris Licht turned CNN’s CEO in 2022, Lemon left his prime-time slot on the community and joined daytime anchor Poppy Harlow and Kaitlan Collins, chief White Home correspondent, to helm a brand new present, CNN This Morning. Colleagues described Lemon as satisfied he was the first host of the present – a conviction his co-hosts and community executives didn’t share. Collins, specifically, instructed buddies at CNN that she felt Lemon was dismissive of her, they usually had clashed off the air.
Throughout the Trump administration, the then-evening anchor was seen as an outspoken critic of the president.
Lemon instructed NPR’s Weekend Version Sunday in 2021 that he believed Trump was typically angered by him due to his id and his method to his work.
“I’m a homosexual Black man who has a platform and who speaks fact to energy. I am not a Democrat nor a Republican. And I feel initially, Donald Trump thought via his interviews with me that he might attempt to co-opt me, and he did not,” Lemon mentioned.
“And after I assume he realized that he wasn’t going to have the ability to co-opt me over on his aspect to — you already know, to not give him a tricky interview or to carry him accountable, I feel his play was to demonize me as a result of that performed along with his base,” he added.
Throughout a current panel discussion with the news outlet Semafor, Licht described Lemon as a “lightning rod.”
“As a result of he actually got here to prominence throughout an period the place that was celebrated and inspired in prime time. That was CNN’s prime time. That isn’t CNN’s prime time” anymore, Licht mentioned.
“The world has moved on from that. Don has moved on from that,” Licht continued. “Don was the primary one to go, ‘I am bored with having to set my hair on hearth each night time. I wish to strive one thing new.’ “
David Folkenflik contributed to this story.
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