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According to New York and other media outlets, the 75-year-old Ailes’ most likely successor, Michael Clemente, was suddenly ousted from his job as the network’s executive vice president for news and moved into a newly created division that will focus on “longform” news programming.
Clemente was replaced by Jay Wallace, an executive who has risen through the ranks to head news coverage and radio operations for the Fox News Channel, according to multiple media reports.
While Ailes reportedly vigorously defended the news veep at a recent meeting of the network’s top executives, some insiders told New York magazine that Clemente had three strikes against him: that Ailes suspected him of leaking to the press; that his relationship with Ailes’ boss, Rupert Murdoch, was seen as a threat; and that he had never really shed his outsider image.
Also apparently gumming up the succession works are rumors that Ailes has been telling folks he would like to take another run at it when his current contract expires, the New York magazine report said.
To read the New York magazine story, click here.
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