Chuck Todd is bidding farewell to NBC News after almost 20 years. The veteran journalist, who spent nine years moderating Meet the Press through three presidential administrations, revealed that Friday marks his final day with the network.
“I am leaving a bit earlier than frankly, we had all originally planned, but there’s a reason for it,” he shared on his podcast, The Chuck ToddCast, Friday. “I’m pretty excited by a few new projects that are on the cusp of going from ‘pie in the sky’ to ‘near reality.'”
The journalist announced that while he will be taking a brief break from reporting—one he expects to last no more than a month—he will continue his podcast on a new platform. He said, “I do plan to continue to share my reporting and my perspective, and to cover politics the way I’ve been covering it with data, history, using that as important baselines and understanding where we were, where we are, and where we’re going,” he said. “I will let you know where I’ll be planting my flag publicly very soon.”
Todd joined NBC News as political director in 2007 and became chief White House correspondent alongside Savannah Guthrie in 2008. He took over as Meet the Press host in 2014, where his tough questioning occasionally drew criticism from Donald Trump, who once called him a “sleeping son of a bitch” at a rally. For nearly a decade, Todd was a leading voice at NBC News, covering Donald Trump’s political ascent and the Democratic response.
Todd was vocal about the damaging effects of misinformation during the Trump era, often facing criticism and ridicule from Trump and his supporters. Todd remained in the role until 2023, when Kristen Welker succeeded him.
“The reason I am ready to move is that I think the media has a lot of work to do, to win back the trust,” he said on his podcast. “I’m a believer that national media is never always really that trusted by people. The farther away something is, the more skeptical we are of it. When it comes to local media, it’s always been the case: people trust local media more than they trust national media.”
Todd added, “It’s the gutting of local media has gotten rid of what I believe are the folks [who] gave national media our credibility. And the national media is not going to fix its credibility on its own. You’re not going to fix credibility by gaming an algorithm with a headline just because you get to increase traffic. I mean, some of the tactics that I’m seeing right now in the national space — I understand it from a business perspective, but it is a terrible idea from a journalistic perspective.”
Todd emphasized the importance of knowing when to step aside, a notable remark in a Washington landscape dominated by longtime political figures. I’d rather leave a little bit too soon than stay a tad too long,” he added.