HuffPo Hires Howard Fineman Away From Newsweek

Arianna Huffington’s gain is Sidney Harman’s loss; editorial exodus continues

The editorial exodus at Newsweek continues unabated.

The Huffington Post announced on Sunday that Howard Fineman, Newsweek’s senior Washington correspondent, columnist and on-air analyst for NBC and MSNBC, is jumping to HuffPo, where he’ll be the site’s senior political editor.

Fineman will cover national politics for HuffPo and continue to contribute to the Peacock network on-air, Huffington said. Fineman work out of the site’s Washington bureau.

“The digital world is where the action is in my line of work,” Fineman said in a statement announcing the move. “And The Huffington Post is at the center of the new paradigm. It’s the best and liveliest online newspaper. But the site also is something entirely new: a mix of journalism as we know (and knew it) and social networking and crowd-sourcing — all of which are shaping the news business in unpredictable yet exciting ways. I look forward to working with the sharp and hard-working editors and reporters at HuffPost, along with their dynamic and pioneering leader, Arianna Huffington.”

Meanwhile, Fineman’s decampment leaves an already skinny Newsweek masthead looking downright anorexic: editor-in-chief Jon Meacham, editor-in-chief Jon Meacham, international editor Fareed Zakaria, editor-at-large Evan Smith, editorial director Mark Miller, diplomatic correspondent Lally Weymouth, national economic correspondent and senior editor Michael Hirsch, economics editor Daniel Gross, investigative reporter Mark Hosenball, Newsweek.com general manager Geoff Reiss and executive editor Gabriel Snyder have or left or announced plans to leave the struggling newsweekly since audio equipment magnate Sidney Harman agreed to but it.

Meanwhile, there are rumors – though just rumors at this point – that Barry Diller and Meacham may be talking about some sort of partnership between the magazine and the Daily Beast, paving the way for Tina Brown to serve as editor of the site and, potentially, the magazine.

Stay tuned.

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