Gayle King renews deal with CBS News, ending speculation about her exit
By Brian Stelter, CNN
(CNN) — As CBS News plots an overhaul of its morning show, Gayle King has renewed her contract to remain at the network, a spokesperson confirmed Wednesday.
“I’m excited about continuing at ‘CBS Mornings.’ As always, I’m open to new adventures here and ready to go,” King said in a statement.
The contract renewal keeps one of the network’s best-known stars in place at a time of tremendous upheaval at CBS and in the television industry writ large.
CBS News, a unit of Paramount, has new leadership; editor-in-chief Bari Weiss has been brainstorming how to reinvigorate the third-place morning show, according to people familiar with the matter.
And Paramount has struck a deal to take over Warner Bros. Discovery, including CNN, foreshadowing a potential merger of CNN and CBS News sometime in the future.
Paramount is pursuing regulatory approval of the deal and hoping to complete the process in the third quarter of this year.
Last fall, shortly after Weiss arrived, Variety magazine cast doubt about King’s future on “CBS Mornings,” the program she has helmed since 2012.
Variety said she was “expected to depart” the show and “may shift to a different role at the news division,” potentially with “a deal to produce her own programming for the network.”
CBS disputed the report at the time. And on Wednesday, King alluded to it in her statement, saying that “rumors of my demise were inaccurate and greatly exaggerated.”
“CBS News is my longtime home,” King continued, “and I am committed to our mission.”
Weiss touted the news by sharing King’s quote in a post on X. She also said in a comment to the Wall Street Journal, which broke the contract renewal news, that King and CBS will work together on “new, enterprising projects that bring her talents to new audiences.”
King and Nate Burleson co-host the weekday morning show, joined by featured host Vladimir Duthiers and other CBS journalists.
King and Burleson’s morning colleague Tony Dokoupil recently shifted to nights as the new anchor of the “CBS Evening News.”
In the mornings, CBS News president Tom Cibrowski said Wednesday, King and Burleson “are fantastic partners on the show and morning TV is more vibrant than ever. We are excited to continue to evolve ‘CBS Mornings’ and can’t wait for what’s to come.”
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