OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Joy Reid is one of the most controversial hosts in cable news and her ratings are starting to show that many people have grown exhausted with their rhetoric.
The controversial host has seen a 50 percent dip in her ratings since her debut in 2020 and just had her lowest rated month ever.
And it comes amid reports that she could be on her way out at MSNBC.
Fox News reported:
“ReidOut” averaged 1.1 million viewers during the news-heavy month, a 31% decline from April of last year. She also shed 11% of viewers who tuned in last month and a staggering 51% compared to the show’s debut month of July 2020.
“ReidOut” has also lost 57% of her total audience among the advertiser-coveted demographic of adults age 25-54 since the program launched in July 2020, finishing April with a dismal demo average of only 124,000 viewers. “ReidOut” viewership during April was MSNBC’s least-watched month during the weeknight 7 p.m. hour among the critical demo since July 2015.
During April, every single Fox News Channel weekday program – including “FOX & Friends First” which airs from 4-6 a.m. ET – outdrew “The ReidOut.”
In March it was reported that Reid could be in serious trouble for her comments about Kyle Rittenhouse both before and after his acquittal.
It came after Rittenhouse told Fox News host Tucker Carlson that his legal team is in the process of going after individuals who slandered and defamed him in the media.
Days later, media reporter Jon Nicosia tweeted that “there is serious talk all the way up the chain at Comcast about Joy Reid’s future at MSNBC.”
SOURCE: There is serious talk all the way up the chain at Comcast about Joy Reid's future at MSNBC.
— Jon Nicosia (@NewsPolitics) November 23, 2021
Reid has made a slew of outrageous comments, but one could argue she’s made a few defamatory comments about Rittenhouse.
After a jury found him not guilty on all five counts, Reid argued Rittenhouse’s acquittal has a historic precedent that goes back to the days of slavery.
“I think we have to keep in mind, when we’re watching the criminal justice system at work, that it was designed to do exactly what it did today,” Reid told her fill-in host Jason Johnson. “Gun laws helped to enhance the design to allow this verdict to happen today. This country was built on the idea that White men had a particular kind of freedom and a particular kind of citizenship that only they have that gives, you know, from the slave catchers on, the right to inflict violence In the name of protecting property. That’s like the foundational creation of the United States.”
Here’s what she said after Rittenhouse testified at his murder trial:
“You want to know why Critical Race Theory exists, the actual law school theory that emphasizes that supposedly colorblind laws in America often still have racially discriminatory outcomes?” she asks. “Then look no further than the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse.”
“Earlier today, the teenager accused of murdering two men and wounding a third in Kenosha, Wisconsin last year took to the stand in his own defense,” she said. “The circumstances are almost built for an actual CRT course. The white now 18-year-old faces an almost entirely white jury of his peers, with the exception of one black man, and then there’s Judge Bruce Schroeder, who has barred the prosecution from calling the people Rittenhouse killed victims.”
Media critic Joe Concha also suggested this week that Reid could be hit with a lawsuit from Rittenhouse.
“That was exhibit A, B, C, D, and E right there,” Concha said. “The next chapter in the Kyle Rittenhouse story are likely multiple defamation lawsuits against not only several media outlets but also MSNBC in particular and a host named Joy Reid, who we had the pleasure of hearing.”
“As for Mrs. Reid and multiple contributors calling Rittenhouse a racist, a white supremacist and, most importantly, guilty until proven innocent… I have got four words for you: ‘Covington Catholic Nicholas Sandmann’ – who sued CNN for what, $275 million, and forced them to settle,” he added.
