Rupert Murdoch is set to step down as the CEO of Fox News Channel’s parent company, CNBC reported Thursday.
Anonymous sources close to the Murdoch family told CNBC that Murdoch, 84, is expected to hand the reins of broadcasting giant 21st Century Fox over to his son, James Murdoch.
Rupert Murdoch is expected to stay on in his capacity as executive chairman of Fox, according to the report.
It’s unclear whether the transition will take place in 2016 or earlier, according to CNBC. The report states that Murdoch’s day-to-day role as chairman of both Fox and News Corp., which publishes newspapers across the globe, is not expected to change.
This post has been updated.
It would be to much to hope that a mistake will be made with his successor and we end up with a Pope Francis sort of situation at Fox News.
If this actually happens (and I doubt that it will, as RM will not go gently into that good night), it will be interesting to see if James Murdoch is embarrassed by the clown show that is FOX News. Unless he dumps Ailes and the various VPs of Disinformation & Propaganda nothing will change.
I’m sure the son will carry on the proud family tradition of presenting “journalism” as a front for scurrilous right-wing propaganda, mixed with barely veiled racism, misogyny and outright cruelty.
I’ll only be happy if his successor makes Roger Ailes walk the plank and he cleans up the whole mess at FOX News and so on.
At this point, Roger Ailes is burrowed into the Fox empire deeper than J. Edgar Hoover was burrowed into the federal government. Fox corporate can no more get rid of Ailes than any of the presidents from JFK to Nixon, all of whom wanted to fire Hoover–with varying levels of intensity–could do so.