Diane Rehm has been a fixture at WAMU in Washington D.C. But her tenure at the station is set to end later this year after 45 years.
Rehm has announced that she has accepted a buyout from the NPR partner station and will exit on Friday, May 2nd. She told The Washington Post that the staffing cuts that took place at the station last year motivated her to leave, but needed to settle on a date before officially accepting a buyout offer from the outlet. Last February, WAMU ended its digital news arm — DCist — which led to 15 members of its staff departing.
In recent years, Diane Rehm has been hosting a podcast — On My Mind — with the outlet, and a monthly book club program that will end in April ahead of her final day.
The 88-year-old joined the station in 1973 as a volunteer before ascending to host her first program in 1979. She later rebranded the show in 1984 to The Diane Rehm Show before stepping away from the daily program in 2015.
While Rehm is exiting WAMU after 45 years, she told the Post that she would not label it a retirement, simply a change of her professional home.
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