It’s Official: CNN Bringing Back Crossfire
Newt Gingrich, S.E. Cupp, Stephanie Cutter, Van Jones to Host Debate Program
CNN today announced that Crossfire, previously the longest
running political debate program on television, will return to the network this
fall. Hosting from the right will be Newt
Gingrich and S.E. Cupp, with Stephanie Cutter and Van Jones hosting from the left.
“Few programs in the history of CNN have had the kind
of impact on political discourse that Crossfire
did – it was a terrific program then, and we believe the time is right to bring
it back and do it again,” said Jeff Zucker, President of CNN Worldwide. “We
look forward to the opportunity to host passionateconversation from all sides
of the political spectrum. Crossfire will be the forum where
America holds its great debates.”
In
addition, all four hosts will appear across the network’s programming and its
special coverage surrounding elections and political events.
“Following
the successful launches of Around
theWorld, The Lead with Jake Tapper,
and New Day, we felt it was the right
time to turn our attention next to Crossfire,”
said Ken Jautz, Executive Vice President of CNN. “This will be the next step in
reinvigorating our lineup of live programs.”
Newt
Gingrich is the former Speaker of the House and former Republican presidential
candidate. He served the Sixth District of Georgia for two decades. Gingrich is
known as the architect of the “Contract with America” that in 1994 led to the
Republican Party majority for the first time in 40 years. In 1995, he was
elected Speaker of the House, where he served until 1999. During his tenure,
Congress passed welfare reform, the first balanced budget in a generation, and
the first tax cut in 16 years. Gingrich is a former Fox News contributor. He
has published 24 books, including 14 fiction and non-fiction New York Times
best-sellers.
S.E. Cupp is
a conservative columnist, commentator and public speaker. She is author of
the book “Losing Our Religion: The Liberal media’s Attack on
Christianity” and co-author of the book “Why You’re Wrong About
the Right.” She will continue her role as a contributor to TheBlaze, now
out of the network’s new Washington bureau, appearing on a variety of network
shows including “Real News.” She is currently
the co-host of MSNBC’s “The Cycle.” In addition, Cupp is a columnist at
the New York Daily News and a contributing editor at
Townhall Magazine.
Stephanie Cutter is a
partner at Precision Strategies, a strategic consulting firm launched earlier
this month with three veterans from the Obama 2012 campaign team. Cutter has a
long history in politics, serving most recently as the deputy campaign manager
for President Obama’s re-election campaign and having joined Obama’s 2008
campaign as Michelle Obama’s chief of staff and senior adviser to then
SenatorObama. Before joining the campaign, she served in the White House
as Assistant to the President and Deputy Senior Adviser for communications
andstrategy, and was previously counselor to Treasury Secretary Timothy
Geithner. Cutter also spent time in the U.S. Senate as a senior advisor to
both Majority Leader Harry Reid and the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy.
Van Jones
is the founding president of Rebuild the Dream, an organization that promotes
innovative policy solutions for the U.S. economy. He is a Yale-educated
attorney and author of two The New York Times best selling books, “The Green
Collar Economy” and “Rebuild the Dream.” He is the founder of four thriving,
not-for-profit organizations. Jones is also the recipient of numerous awards,
including: the World Economic Forum’s “Young Global Leader” designation; one of
Rolling Stone magazine’s “12 Leaders Who Get Things Done” in 2012; one of Time
Magazine’s 2009 “100 Most Influential People in The World.” In 2009, Jones
worked as the green jobs advisor for the Obamaadministration.
Crossfire,
which aired weeknights from 1982 to 2005, examined political and social issues
in a televised debate. Conservative Pat Buchanan and liberal Tom Braden were
the original hosts of the program, but over the years Crossfire featuredvarious hosts from the right and from the left,
including Robert Novak, Tucker Carlson, James Carville and Paul Begala. Guests
on the program were frequently top lawmakers from across the political
spectrum, but also included an eclectic mix of other personalities: Bob Hope,
Rupert Murdoch, Charlton Heston, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Dr. Jack Kevorkian, Rush
Limbaugh, Christopher Reeves, Arianna Huffington and Howard Cosell. As the
preeminent political talk program, Crossfire
cemented its status in the political and cultural lexicon when President
Bill Clinton joked during hisremarks at the 1997 White House Correspondents’
Association Dinner that the newly opened Newseum featured an exhibit with
“CNN’s very first Crossfire-- from
the left, Alexander Hamilton, from the right, Aaron Burr, topic, gun control.”
12 comments:
I give up CNN will never learn. After being mocked on social media for their lack of coverage on the Texas abortion debate, CNN makes what will go down as one of the dumbest moves ever. It's simple things have changed and CNN keeps believing in pundits who no one cares about. Ever hear of social media CNN. Instead of coming up with new and innovative shows CNN thinks viewers will go for yapping and arguing. Boring.
The last thing CNN needs is more misinformation
on their network.
Newt Gingrich?! What the..?
Oh great, S.E. Cupp AND Newt Gingrich??? Pure HELL.
Whoever the AC360 staffer is who replies to tweets concerning the content of the show should realize that snide responses are a good way to alienate long time viewers.
I can't believe CNN is going to give Newt Gingrich any air time. That man has turned political hackery into a fortune for himself and CNN is helping him do it?!?! They couldn't find any other conservative who was less sleezy? Yuk.
Newt Gingrich is OLD NEWS and irrelevant. There are many other conservative voices out there who would be a better fit. IIRC, they hired Kevin Madden along with Stephanie Cutter as political contributors. Madden would've been better than Gingrich, even if I don't agree with a single thing he stands for.
CNN is making a big mistake hiring Newt Gingrich. Someone has clearly lost their mind. CNN's political coverage is already bad enough, now we go from bad to worse. Pundits make CNN unwatchable. They need to have real reporters doing their jobs and covering all of the bases by sticking to facts. Who care what any of these talking heads think. No one will watch CNN and they are making themselves viewer repellent. Obviously, CNN learned nothing from the 2012 election. The idiotic statements from Newt Gingrich earns him a job on CNN. How low can CNN go.
2:51pm, I totally agree - Newt Gingrich is a loser. So many others could have been a better representative of Conservatism. Gingrich is just a corrupt carnival barker. I love politics but I can't tolerate watching that guy.
Newt is old news.
Sorry. Hiring him is like shooting yourself in the foot.
CNN wants to attract younger viewers? Well none of them were alive when he was in Congress.
To them, a newt is a lizard...and it still is.
What I don't understand is, after the positive feedback and good ratings the AC360 panel experiment got, why now this?
To me, the $64,000 question is what time will it air? Hmmmmm? Is this going in the 10pm slot they have been experimenting with? That doesn't seem like the best fit. Does this mean the Burnett and her ratings loser show get downgraded? I hope so but she specified primetime in her contract so where could they dump her? Is Piers getting the axe? Can't see them replacing an interview/lifestyle show with hard politics. Maybe Wolf is about to lose another hour. The timeslot is the fascinating question... won't watch Gringrich no matter what time he is on.
This will be the end of CNN...........for sure.
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