MSNBC host Rachel Maddow announced Monday she will host her show on the network weekly starting in May.
Maddow will host her show “The Rachel Maddow Show” every Monday to pivot toward other projects for MSNBC and parent company NBCUniversal. The show will have a rotating lineup of hosts running the show on Tuesdays through Fridays, a source told Fox News.
“I’m gonna be here all this month Monday through Thursday nights,” she said. “Now for big news events, for things like the lead up to the election I will, of course, be here more than that but that is the general plan … then starting in May I’m going to be here weekly. I’m going to be here on Monday nights just to give myself more time to work on some of this other stuff I’ve got cooking for MSNBC and NBC.”
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The show’s name is slated to change to “MSNBC Prime” on the nights Maddow is not hosting, a network spokesperson told CNN.
Maddow took a hiatus from the network in early February to focus on movie and podcast productions before making an official return to the show Monday. The projects included a film collaboration with Ben Stiller and Lorn Michaels to adapt her book and podcast “Bag Man.” She returned to the network to cover President Joe Biden’s State of the Union Address.
The majority of her vacancy was filled by MSNBC host Ali Velshi who she called a “prince among men” and a “great coworker” during Monday’s episode. (RELATED: Rachel Maddow Says She Needs To ‘Rewire’ Her Brain So She Won’t View Unmasked People As ‘Selfish’ Threats)
Maddow signed a multi-year deal in August with NBCUniversal to begin only hosting her show weekly, Business Insider first reported.
“The Rachel Maddow Show” was MSNBC’s most watched show in 2021 averaging a total of nearly 2.3 million viewers, trailing Fox News’ “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” “Hannity” and “The Five,” a July cable news scoreboard found. She is the only MSNBC host to top 2 million viewers and rank among the ten most-watched cable news programs, the other nine being Fox News shows, Fox News reported.
The week of April 4 through 8 is expected to be the lowest-rated week for her show since December 2016 with an average of only 1.3 million viewers, the outlet reported. The show has lost 40% of its viewers since the week Maddow last hosted it.