Fox News CEO and Chairman Roger Ailes sent a note to Fox News employees about recent revelations of DOJ investigations involving members of the press, including FNC correspondent James Rosen. “To be a Fox journalist is a high honor, not a high crime,” Ailes writes.

The administration’s attempt to intimidate Fox News and its employees will not succeed and their excuses will stand neither the test of law, the test of decency, nor the test of time. We will not allow a climate of press intimidation, unseen since the McCarthy era, to frighten any of us away from the truth.

In an interview soon after Pres. Obama’s re-election in November, Ailes told us Fox News’s often chilly relationship with the Obama White House was “day-to-day.”

“I don’t mind praising the guy and I don’t mind questioning the guy.”

The full memo after the jump…

(h/t Playbook)

Read more

• PBS host Tavis Smiley celebrates his 2,000th show tomorrow. Smiley’s diverse guest list, from musicians to presidents, authors, actors, and activists, will be highlighted in a clip reel. Smiley’s show premiered on PBS in 2004.

• This Memorial Day Weekend CBS’s Steve Kroft, a Vietnam veteran, will host “Combat Stress: Finding the Way Home” on CBS Radio News. The one hour show explores the impact of post-traumatic stress disorder on our nation’s veterans.
• Ann Curry anchored her first newscast for NBC News in 11 months. The former “Today” co-host was filling in for Brian Williams this evening on “Nightly News.” She posted this image (above) to Instagram about 15 minutes before the show.

25-54 demographic (Live +SD)

• Total day: FNC: 297 | MSNBC: 120 | CNN: 167 | HLN: 262

• Primetime: FNC: 454 | MSNBC: 188 | CNN: 201 | HLN: 285

Read more

Tom Mazzarelli (left) has been named Co-Executive Producer of the first two hours of NBC’s “Today” show, TVNewser has learned. At the same time, Tammy Filler has been named Co-EP of the third and fourth hours of the show. Both will report to show EP Don Nash.

Mazzarelli is a “Today” veteran, having served as a senior producer on the show from 2003-2006. He left NBC for CBS where, most recently, he was senior broadcast producer of “CBS This Morning,” a job he left in January. Nash took the top spot at “Today” in November. He reports to Alex Wallace who is executive-in-charge of the show.

During President Obama’s speech to the National Defense University, he was interrupted a handful of times by a protester who called for him to shut down the prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (video after the jump).

As so often happens when there is a heckler, news coverage of the speech spent some time talking about the heckler rather than the meat of the speech itself. No cable news channel dwelled on the protester, but both CNN and MSNBC spent time talking about her right after it concluded that would otherwise have been spent talking about what the President actually said. Fox News didn’t mention the protester at all right after the speech, even during a segment about the President’s comments on Guantanamo.

Here’s what was said on cable news right after the speech concluded:
Read more

CBS’ “Face the Nation” was the top-rated Sunday public affairs show on May 19, besting NBC’s “Meet the Press” by +210,000 Total Viewers and +181,000 A25-54 viewers.

Compared to the same week last year, every show except “Meet the Press” is up in both ratings measurements. “Fox News Sunday” grew the most in Total Viewers (+31%) and Univision’s “Al Punto” was up the most in A25-54 viewers (+46%). “Meet the Press” is flat in Total Viewers and down -13% in the demo.

Cable replays of “Fox News Sunday” averaged a combined 1,908,000 Total Viewers and 312,000 viewers in the demo. Rebroadcasts of “Meet the Press” delivered 993,000 Total Viewers and 518,000 A25-54 viewers.

“Face the Nation” is based on the first half-hour only, as the full contiguous hour aired in just 66% of the country.

The numbers for May 19:

President Obama spoke this afternoon at the National Defense University. The bulk of the speech was focused on national security, but for a few minutes, the President weighed in on the investigations the Justice Department has conducted involving journalists, including Fox News correspondent James Rosen and the Associated Press.

Obama says that Attorney General Holder has agreed to review the guidelines and talk to media outlets, and will report back to the President in July.

“I am troubled by the possibility that leak investigations may chill the investigative journalism that holds government accountable,” Obama said, adding that “Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs.”

The full text of his comments on the press are after the jump.
Read more

On “CBS This Morning” co-hosts Charlie Rose and Norah O’Donnell were talking about the falling price of gold with contributor Melody Hobson. The discussion turned to how gold has been sold over the years, on radio and TV. Those tactics even came under congressional scrutiny (by, as it turns out, the guy now running for NYC mayor). That led Rose to chime in: “I tend not to take stock advice from television.” Rose not only hosts a show on CBS, but also on business news channel Bloomberg.

Just to give you a sense of what the Jodi Arias trial has meant for cable news viewership, take a look at Tuesday’s 2pm hour. As the devastation in Moore, OK was still settling in, 1,000 miles to the west Arias was asking a jury to spare her life. While Fox News and MSNBC remained with storm coverage, HLN and CNN both carried Arias’ comments which began at 1:56pmET. Arias spoke for about 20 minutes. HLN won the 2pm hour Tuesday. In fact the network beat the combined averages of Fox News and MSNBC in both total viewers and the demo. Now you know why HLN has become the new CourtTV.

• 2pm hour, Tuesday May 21 (Total Viewers / A25-54)

HLN:  2,227,000 / 620,000
CNN:  964,000 / 332,000
Fox News:  1,488,000 / 270,000
MSNBC:  337,000 / 111,000

• “Good Morning America” had 6.1 million viewers Wednesday, the morning after the “Dancing with the Stars” finale, according to Nielsen fast affiliate data. The early numbers indicate it was “GMA”‘s largest Total Viewer advantage ever over the “Today” show, which drew 4.5 million.

• Kevin Brockman, the EVP of Global Communications for Disney/ABC Television Group, has been elected Chairman of the Board of the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network, an organization focused on school safety. He’s been on the Board of Trustees since 2007.

• A first for Fox Business this week: the network scored its first primetime wins against CNBC (excluding Election coverage) Tuesday night. At 8pmET, “Cavuto” beat “Crowd Rules” by +88,000 Total Viewers and +1,000 demo viewers. At 9pmET, a re-air of “The Willis Report” beat the second hour of “Crowd Rules” by +34,000 Total Viewers and +2,000 A25-54 viewers.