The NBCUniversal News group is planning an editorial initiative over the next couple of days to put a spotlight on immigration reform in America.

The coverage will culminate Friday evening on “Rock Center,” with Brian Williams interviewing Laurene Powell Jobs–the widow of Apple founder Steve Jobs–about her work advocating for young, undocumented immigrants. It will be Jobs’ first interview since her husband’s death.

Other coverage includes a number of stories on the NBC news programs, analysis of the political debates on MSNBC, coverage of the economic impact of immigration on CNBC and a number of stories on NBCLatino.com and Thegrio.com. In addition, two NBC News/Wall Street Journal surveys about immigration will be released today.
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The Hollywood Reporter released its 2013 “35 Most Powerful People In Media” list, and TV news dominates the winners. The list looks at the most dominant media personalities in New York.

The list includes (in alphabetical order) Roger Ailes, Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough, Anderson Cooper, Bob Costas, Katie Couric, Jeff Fager, Pat Fili-Krushel, James Goldston, Phil Griffin, Sean Hannity, Megyn Kelly, the “60 Minutes” team, the “Today” team, Rachel Maddow, Piers Morgan, Bill O’Reilly, Scott Pelley, David Rhodes, The “Good Morning America” team, the “CBS This Morning” team, Diane Sawyer, Ben Sherwood, Barbara Walters, Brian Williams and Jeff Zucker.

Some of the recipients gave interviews, others did not. You can see the full list here.

All three evening newscasts are have grown in total viewers compared to the same week last year: “NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams” was up +6%, “ABC World News with Diane Sawyer” was up +8% and “CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley” was up +10%.

Among younger viewers, NBC is up +9% and ABC is up +8% year-over year. CBS is down slightly, -2%.

For the week of April 1, NBC had a +974,000 viewer lead on ABC, which leads CBS by +987,000.

Numbers for the week of April 1, 2013:

All three evening newscasts grew their total viewer audiences last week compared to the same week last year. “NBC Nightly News” with Brian Williams” remains the #1 evening newscast with more than a half million viewer lead on #2 “ABC World News with Diane Sawyer.” But the ABC broadcast continues to close the gap which last year stood at 874,000 viewers. The younger viewer gap has also narrowed by -78%.

On Good Friday, “ABC World News” was retitled “Wrld News Tonite” and is excluded from the average. Due to NCAA Basketball “CBS Evening News” aired with low coverage leaving Thursday and Friday out of the average. Only “NBC Nightly News” is based on all 5 days.

Numbers for the week of March 25, 2013:

This also closes out the first quarter of 2013. For the quarter, “Nightly News” wins in both measurements, but is down -2% in total viewers and down -4% in younger viewers compared to Q1 2012. Both “World News” and “CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley” grew viewership. ABC is up +4% in total viewers and +2% in younger viewers while CBS is up +7% and 1%, respectively. It was CBS’ best Q1 in total viewers since 2007.

Numbers for Q1 2013:

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NBC Newsman Brian Williams went on “Late Show with David Letterman” last night and, right out of the gate, Letterman asked him the news about the news at NBC, both the “Today” show and the “Tonight Show.” Williams didn’t blink, even when Dave asked him after a long recap of the news: “If I’m on to something, blink twice.” Williams didn’t. (Clip after the jump)

Letterman moved on congratulating Williams on his 20 years at NBC News, calling him, “the heart and soul of America’s most-watched regular nightly news program.”

Later, Letterman asked about Williams being on a list of those who could take over hosting “Jeopardy!” when and if Alex Trebek retires. “While it is true that my legal representative got a call from Herb Schmendrick at Sony Studios to say ‘would he ever be interested we would love to have him.’ I answered in the form of a question ‘Who is Herb Schmendrick?’”

Williams said it’s become a family joke: “Oh, that will be when dad’s the host of ‘Jeopardy.’”

And when asked if he’d ever consider doing late night comedy, Williams said he’s “more wired for what I’m doing,” but added, “I’m not sure I’d never leave the venue of news. It chews people up and spits people out. It’s a young man’s game and any other cliches you want to pile on there.

When I go I’m just going to go. I’ll be at the Jersey Shore on a P.O. Box. But I’m not going to stay on it forever.”

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ABC’s “World News with Diane Sawyer” saw double digit viewer growth last week when compared to the same week last year. “World News” was up +11% in total viewers and up +7% in younger viewers.

The Sawyer broadcast has seen increases in 11 of the last 12 weeks in total viewers and has cut its year-to-year margins with “NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams” among both Total Viewers (-56% – 525,000 vs. 1.20 million) and A25-54 viewers (-69% – 146,000 vs. 467,000).

Once again, “Nightly” was the clear winner in both categories for the week, showing +1% total viewer growth, but down -7% in younger viewers.

“CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley” also saw growth compared to last year: +10% in total viewers and +4% in younger viewers.

“CBS Evening News” aired with low coverage and was broken out on Thursday and Friday due to NCAA Basketball. Ratings for both days were excluded from the average.

Numbers for the week of March 18, 2013:

Hollywood mega-agent Ari Emanuel and his brothers Rahm Emanuel (the Mayor of Chicago) and Zeke Emanuel (a doctor and bioethicist) were interviewed on “Rock Center.” The segment itself was pretty innocuous, and the three brothers come out of it looking great.

Ari, however, didn’t think so. According to the New York Post, Emanuel sent a legal letter to NBC over the interview, and even confronted NBCUniversal CEO Steve Burke about it during a taping of “Saturday Night Live.” He apparently thought that the questioning was too tough, though you wouldn’t know it from the final product:

NBC News chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell and CNN chief White House correspondent Jessica Yellin have been named to Elle‘s list of the 10 most influential women in Washington.

Elle calls Mitchell the “living, breathing embodiment” of fictional heroines:

Andrea Mitchell idolized plucky heroines like Nancy Drew and Brenda Starr when she was a girl; today, as NBC News’ chief foreign affairs correspondent, she’s the living, breathing embodiment of those fearless investigators, careening daily from Today at the crack of dawn to her own show, Andrea Mitchell Reports, on MSNBC at midday to the Nightly News With Brian Williams, and then back home to her husband, former federal reserve chairman Alan Greenspan (how’s that for a power couple?).

[...] “Andrea is a network-news legend in real time,” says Brian Williams. “She’s a trailblazer who remains in control of the trail.”

The magazine also profiles Yellin, who cleared several hurdles on her path to become the sole female chief White House correspondent: Read more

Former ABC News anchor and current NBC “Rock Center” contributor Ted Koppel talks to the AP about a report he has on young adults serving time in adult prisons.

Along the way he has a few words about NBC’s shuffling of “Rock Center” in its lineup. The primetime newsmagazine anchored by Brian Williams has been shuffled across NBC’s lineup a number of times, before settling in on Fridays earlier this year.

“Just when you think somebody might figure out when it’s on and want to see it the next week, they move it to another place,” said the former “Nightline” anchor. “That’s not helpful, and I think Brian deserves more support than that.”

He said Williams is “a powerhouse of a guy, and I think he’s going to emerge triumphant in the end.”

Shortly after 2:30pmET, President Obama and Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu took the podium for a joint press conference from Jerusalem. Fox News, CNN and MSNBC took the press conference live. NBC News was the only broadcast network to offer a special report, anchored by Brian Williams in New York.

Obama and Netanyahu took three questions: one from the Israeli press, one from Matt Spetalnick of Reuters, and one from NBC’s Chuck Todd, who asked about the peace process. Todd asked several follow up questions, which led to an exchange with the President and Prime Minister.

“Do you guys do this in this Israeli press? You say you get one question, and then you add like five?” Obama asked jokingly. “Did you see how the young lady from Channel One — she had one question, and she was very well-behaved, Chuck.”

“I thought I had four questions,” Todd responded. “Passover starts in a couple days. I get four questions.”

“This is not a kosher question, but don’t hog it,” Netanyahu said.

Obama went on to his answer, calling Todd “incorrigible.”

David Gregory joked to Williams afterward, “That Chuck Todd included dietary law and Passover in his question is, I think, news and significant. Something they’ll be talking about in Jersusalem.”