Weeks after his co-anchor John Dickerson announced he was leaving both CBS Evening News and the Tiffany Network before the end of the year, Maurice DuBois revealed that he was following his colleague out the door.
DuBois’ exit, meanwhile, hardly comes as a surprise. Recently installed editor-in-chief Bari Weiss has been openly courting high-profile talent at other networks to take over CBS News’ flagship evening broadcast, which has been stuck in third place for years amid various reboots and anchor changes.
In fact, DuBois was part of the latest effort to revitalize the franchise that was once hosted by Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather. After dumping lead anchor Norah O’Donnell after a five-plus-year run, the network tried an outside-the-box approach by tapping Dickerson and DuBois as a two-man team and moving the DC-based program to New York City.
The experiment, which also saw the show attempting to replicate elements of 60 Minutes’ newsmagazine style, never really took hold with viewers as ratings continued to sink. In the end, DuBois and Dickerson lasted less than a year behind the desk.
With Dickerson already announcing his departure in late October after 16 years with the network, DuBois told staffers on Thursday morning that his last day with both the Evening News and CBS will be December 18. Dickerson will also be exiting around that same time.
“It has been the Honor of a Lifetime. 21 years altogether, including my time at WCBS-TV in New York City,” DuBois shared on Instagram following his internal announcement. “What a privilege! To be welcomed into your homes night after night, delivering the news / meeting extraordinary people and telling their stories. I’ll leave filled with gratitude, cherished relationships and amazing memories.”
The 60-year-old joined WCBS-TV – the network’s East Coast flagship station – in 2004 and became the channel’s evening news anchor. He also co-anchored the station’s morning and noontime news broadcasts throughout his tenure there before the network called him up to co-host the CBS Evening News earlier this year.
“Maurice has long represented what we do best at CBS News and Stations,” CBS News President Tom Cibrowski said in a statement. “For more than two decades, he has delivered the day’s biggest stories from our studios in New York and in the field.”
He added: “Maurice is deeply valued and respected as a journalist by all of us and we wish him much success. It is my hope that we can work together again. We will have more details on the next chapter of CBS Evening News in the near future.”
The Independent has reached out to a CBS News spokesperson for additional comment on the program’s current anchor situation.
Weiss, the heterodox founder of “anti-woke” digital media outlet The Free Press, was tapped by Paramount chief David Ellison to lead the newsroom in early October. Paramount also purchased The Free Press for $150 million.
Since her arrival, Weiss – who reports directly to Ellison – has made rebooting the weeknight news telecast one of her top priorities, including looking to poach high-priced talent from other networks to make a splash.
Among the prominent figures she’s eyed as potential targets are Fox News chief political anchor Bret Baier, CNN mainstay Anderson Cooper, Fox News host Dana Perino, and ABC News correspondent Matt Gutman. The problem, however, is that most of the personalities she’s approaching are locked in multi-year contracts with rival networks that aren’t going to be too keen on breaking the deals.
Meanwhile, the top internal names for the position are CBS Mornings co-anchor Tony Dokoupil, whom Weiss and The Free Press fervently defended last year after he was reprimanded by CBS News management for a tense, aggressive interview with celebrated author Ta-Nehisi Coates.
Since Weiss’ arrival, Dokoupil has scored an exclusive interview with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and is seen as the favorite internally to take over CBS Evening News. At the same time, according to several CBS sources, he’s told his morning show colleagues he’s not interested in moving to the evening.
O’Donnell could also potentially return to the weeknight anchor chair and has been aggressively lobbying Weiss for another chance amid the network upheaval, according to CBS insiders.
Sources have said that a more likely scenario, though, would be O’Donnell moving to CBS Mornings – even if Dokoupil were to remain in his current post. Current co-anchor Gayle King’s contract is up in a few months, and it has been reported that the 70-year-old star is expected to depart the morning program.
