You might have thought that after weeks of boosterism leading up to the presidential election, breathless reporting of Kamala Harris’ last minute surge in the polls, channel-wide optimism that women, brown and Black people were poised to reject Donald Trump a second time — only to be found dead wrong — that MSNBC would be in a moment of crisis.
But you’d be wrong.
Instead of reexamining its news practices after months of relentless pro-Harris coverage that seems to have wildly underestimated voters’ economic anger, a cultural backlash and Latino surge for Trump, insiders at MSNBC are feeling confident.
WaxWord spoke to a half-dozen individuals at MSNBC and NBCUniversal and the conclusion was consistent: MSNBC is fine, despite criticism from media observers like Bill Maher or Jay Rosen or myself, and a steep drop in ratings.