Fox News veteran Shepard Smith quits
Shepard Smith, the chief news anchor of Fox News and a sometime critic of President Donald Trump, abruptly quit the network on Friday after 23 years.
In an unexpected on-air statement at the end of his daily “Shepard Smith Reporting” show, Smith said he had asked to leave the conservative-leaning cable news network, which is the most-watched in the United States.
His farewell message ended with the hope that “the truth will always matter.”
“Recently I asked the company to allow me to leave Fox News. After requesting that I stay, they obliged. Under our agreement I won’t be reporting elsewhere, at least in the near future,” Smith said.
“Even in our currently polarized nation, it’s my hope that the facts will win the day, that the truth will always matter, that journalism and journalists will survive,” Smith said.
Smith, who was also managing editor of the network’s breaking news unit, has been one of the few senior journalists on Fox News to criticize Trump.
His departure follows attacks by Trump on the network’s less friendly coverage of his administration since the U.S. House of Representatives began an impeachment inquiry, which opinion polls suggest has growing support from Americans.
In March, Smith took issue with Trump’s criticism of the late Republican Sen. John McCain, and in August Smith spoke out about the “unmistakable rise of white nationalism and white racism in America,” which Democrats say Trump has not done enough to discourage.
In September, Smith called out Trump for his mistaken insistence that the state of Alabama was in the path of Hurricane Dorian.
Trump has lashed out publicly against Shepard.
“Watching Fake News CNN is better than watching Shepard Smith, the lowest rated show on @ FoxNews,” Trump tweeted in August.