This weekend, NBC News has something to celebrate as “Meet the Press” anchor Chuck Todd reaches his fifth anniversary amongst continued ratings success.
Like most weeks in the past few years, this has been a wild one for the news industry.
President Donald Trump has continued his attack on the press, of course, while major stories affecting real people play out. Sometimes, they intersect. Take this week’s “SharpieGate.” Trump insisted that he wasn’t wrong for inaccurately claiming Hurricane Dorian was headed towards Alabama and then said that the media unfairly attacked him for those claims.
That’s the sort of thing viewers can count on being covered on this week’s Sunday shows across the networks. Don’t expect anything special for Todd’s five-year milestone.
One source with knowledge of the show’s operations told TheWrap that “for the Meet the Press team, it’s just another Sunday, breaking down the week’s most important political news stories to viewers.”
Another source said, “There’s a lot of pride for how the show continues to grow and for the loyal viewers each week.”
Under Todd, the show has expanded from its traditional hour-long network broadcast on Sundays to a daily show on MSNBC, “Meet the Press Daily.” Like any self-respecting media brand in 2019, it has a newsletter and a podcast. There’s even a “Meet the Press” Film Festival for documentary short films.
All of that is fine, but ultimately ratings determine whether a television show is a winner or loser. As far as ratings go, “Meet the Press” has ranked No. 1 across the board for three consecutive seasons and was the most-watched Sunday show in the key 25-54 age demo for the last 14 consecutive quarters.
To celebrate Todd, the “Meet the Press” Twitter account put out the following video of his “biggest and most memorable moments over the last half-decade.”
This Sunday marks five years of @chucktodd in the @MeetThePress moderator chair. Here’s a look back at some of the biggest and most memorable moments over the last half-decade. #IfItsSunday pic.twitter.com/jomTx1B4xj
— Meet the Press (@MeetThePress) September 6, 2019
“Meet the Press” airs Sunday mornings on NBC (check your local listings).