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Abby Phillip has only been hosting her NewsNight program on CNN for just over a year, but she believes it is already changing and evolving.
In a Q&A with Forbes, Phillip was asked about how the opportunity to host the primetime program on CNN came about. She said the timing came as the October 7th attacks by Hamas in Israel had just taken place, leading to a somewhat somber news cycle.
“The show at that time — and for most of the time that we’ve been doing it, maybe the first seven or eight months — has been a news show covering world events, covering domestic events, covering a lot of politics, even culture,” said Phillip. “I think that has always been kind of true to who I am as a journalist is that first, I am a journalist. I started covering politics — I know that really well, my first job was at Politico, so that is really at the foundation of my training as a journalist — but we have covered all kinds of different topics.
“We also particularly tried to make room for these sort of important cultural conversations about what’s happening in the country in sports, in media, and in all these different areas. More recently, in July, right after the RNC, we sort of relaunched to lead up to the election as NewsNight State of the Race, which is really focused on politics, predominantly. That version of the show is just a big conversation for an hour, usually with the same group of four or five people.
“We kind of go deep on what’s happening in the news, on all the different perspectives – and that version of the show, I think, really has resonated with these unprecedented times because people need a place to de-brief it all and we’ve been giving that to them. And so, NewsNight has evolved – is evolving – to meet the needs of the news cycle and of the audience, and it’s been really fun to kind of do all these different things. I like having range as a journalist – it keeps things interesting for me.”
Abby Phillip continued by noting that she believes in the importance of sharing different viewpoints on the CNN show and having people address each other directly rather than throw thinly veiled attacks at one another through other means.
“I think that, to me, is one of the most unique parts of what we do,” she concluded.
