CNN President Jeff Zucker plans to step down when his contract expires at the end of the year, ending his tenure atop the cable news channel as it tries to hold onto ratings gains from a busy news cycle.
Zucker told staff about his plans in a morning meeting Thursday, according to CNN.
The longtime broadcast executive has been president of CNN since 2013. He is also chairman of news and sports for WarnerMedia, which is owned by AT&T.
Zucker, 55, led the network through President Donald Trump’s four tumultuous years, achieving recent viewership increases during a bitterly contested election and a mob attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. That day was the most-watched in CNN’s history, and the network ended January as the most-watched cable news network, notching a rare victory over Fox News.