Former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki has landed her own Sunday talk show.
In a press release Thursday, MSNBC announced that the Biden administration’s former top communicator will debut her own talk show, “Inside with Jen Psaki,” beginning March 19. The network also announced that she will debut a show on streaming platforms and social media, and will contribute a regular column to its morning newsletter. Psaki left the Biden administration to join the liberal cable news network last year.
“Inside with Jen Psaki will leverage Psaki’s wide-ranging expertise to tackle the biggest issues of the week, featuring one-on-one interviews with newsmakers,” MSNBC said in its press release. “Each Sunday, she will break down and make sense of the most complex public policy discussions happening in the Nation’s Capital from the debt ceiling to the political campaign trail to the war in Ukraine and more.”
The new show will also have an original segment entitled “Weekend Routine,” in which Psaki will follow public figures around to see a day in their lives. “Psaki will pull back the curtain on the everyday lives of notable lawmakers and influential thought leaders,” the press release stated. “She will shadow each newsmaker as they move through their usual activities discussing their work, careers and personal lives, spotlighting a unique and often unseen side.”
Psaki will continue to be a regular contributor and panelist across the left-wing cable network’s regular programming, especially with regard to the 2024 presidential election, the network continued. She will continue her presence in MSNBC’s primetime coverage of major news events, and will continue to appear on NBC News’ broadcast TV mainstays like the “TODAY” show and “Meet the Press.”
Psaki reacted to the press release on Twitter. “Let’s do this…looking forward to Sunday, March 19th,” she wrote. “We have been working on some fun and different features…and can’t wait to dig into all of the news.. [sic] see you soon.”
Psaki’s new show adds to MSNBC’s Sunday lineup, which already includes “The Sunday Show with Jonathan Capehart.” Psaki has also been a regular panelist on “Meet the Press,” NBC News’ long-running Sunday talk show. And Psaki is not the first former member of the Biden administration to receive a hosting gig on MSNBC: Symone Sanders, former senior adviser and chief spokesperson for Vice President Kamala Harris, was hired by the network to host her own show, “The Choice from MSNBC,” on NBC’s Peacock streaming service. NBC has not stopped there: former White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain told The New York Times that NBC reached out to him about taking an on-air position, but he turned them down.
Psaki’s hiring was met with some controversy among NBC staffers when it was first announced last year, so much so that network President Noah Oppenheim held an impromptu phone meeting with staffers who felt that hiring her tarnished the NBC News brand. “Here’s what he was saying: They have perspective programming,” one person who was on the call told CNN at the time. “This was done on the perspective programming side. Not anything that reflects on NBC News.”
“People wanted answers on what NBC’s role was in this and NBC News had no role in this,” the person added. “This is MSNBC’s perspective programming.”