Fox News has according to the NYT report offered over $20 million to Kelly to stay at the network.
Advertisement
Kelly’s departure deals a major blow to Fox News, where her weeknight program “The Kelly File” was the second most popular show in all of cable news, behind only “The O’Reilly Factor”.
The announcement, initially reported by The New York Times and confirmed by NBC minutes later, appeared to catch Fox News somewhat off guard. “Now that I’ve gotten into primetime things have become more competitive between us, just given the nature of where we are”, she said referring to O’Reilly. In her tweet on Tuesday, Kelly said she was deeply grateful to Fox News, its leaders and Fox’s viewers, “who have taught me so much about what really matters”.
At the time, Fox News CEO Rupert Murdoch, who is also co-executive chairman of its parent company, 21st Century Fox, told The New York Times he hoped Kelly won’t go anywhere.
Get the hottest, most important news stories on the Internet – delivered FREE to your inbox as soon as they break!
Her 12-year stint with the network has been marked by upheavals and personal attacks on the campaign trail.
And while Kelly’s contract at Fox runs through this summer, it sounds as though she’ll be let out of it early. Kelly announced the move in a short statement posted on her social media accounts.
It is not immediately known what Kelly’s salary will be at NBC, but it is expected to be a significant raise, despite Kelly already being one of the highest paid television news personalities. The last nightly host to leave Fox was Paula Zahn, and she quickly became a liberal cog at CNN like every other host. She will also participate in the network’s special political programming and other big-event coverage.
The reports came months after former Fox boss, Roger Ailes, was sacked over charges of sexual harassment.
Kelly’s anti-fans were also cheering her departure on Facebook groups dedicated to Trump.
In November, Kelly revealed details of Ailes’s alleged harassment in her memoir Settle for More, which debuted on bestseller lists.
Advertisement
Since 2013, Kelly has anchored Fox’s top-rated “The Kelly File”. “Quite frankly, Fox News has carved out a very strong niche”.
