Gayle King is expected to leave her role as an anchor on “CBS Mornings” after 14 years with the morning show.
Variety reported that King would depart when her contract expires in May 2026. According to the trade publication, she may shift to a role at the company’s news division.
CBS’s news division was overhauled this week after its parent company, Paramount, issued layoffs that impacted almost 100 staffers. These were a part of a larger layoff of 1000 across all of Paramount, resulting from Skydance’s acquisition of Paramount Global. With the change in ownership, Skydance has also hired Bari Weiss, of the conservative opinion outlet The Free Press, as the editor-in-chief of CBS News.
Keeping King at the company is top priority for the news division, according to the report. A spokesperson for CBS News told Variety, “There have been no discussions with Gayle about her contract that runs through May 2026. She’s a truly valued part of CBS and we look forward to engaging with her about the future.”
Skydance, which is run by CEO David Ellison, is working to change the direction of CBS News’s content, which Ellison believes leans too liberal. Bringing in Weiss is a part of the company’s plan to attract a broader viewership.
King has become a mainstay in the morning news. The moment she may be most known for is her viral 2019 interview with the disgraced R&B singer, R. Kelly, where he stood up out of his chair and screamed at her when she questioned him about his child sexual abuse charges. She opened up about the experience on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” which CBS is cancelling in 2026.
“I decided if I sit there quietly, make eye contact with him- [because] I thought the minute I stood up or walked up and say- you know what it’s like when someone tells you, ‘Calm down,’ and you go, ‘I am calm!” I figured that would make it worse,” she said told Colbert. “So I thought if I just sit there quietly, looking at him, he would know that I’m not going anywhere, and I’ll just wait for you to finish whatever this is, and you’ll just sit back down in the seat. And he did.”
Earlier this year, she was chosen to travel to space with Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin company.
King began her broadcast career in Baltimore as a production assistant at WJZ-TV. She met Oprah Winfrey during this time, and later worked with her as a special correspondent for “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” which started her career in talk shows and daytime television.
When she joined CBS News as a morning anchor in 2011, she worked alongside Charlie Rose and Norah O’Donnell. Rose left CBS due to sexual harassment allegations, and King carried the show on with Anthony Mason and Tony Dokoupil, then later Dokoupil and Nate Burleson.
