Three weeks after Roger Ailes’s ouster as chairman and chief executive of Fox News, the cable network has promoted two people to top leadership positions.
The veteran Fox executives Bill Shine and Jack Abernethy were named co-presidents, Rupert Murdoch,
the Fox News chief executive, announced in a statement on Friday. Mr.
Shine will be in charge of programming at Fox News and Fox Business
Network, while Mr. Abernethy will be in charge of finance, business and
legal affairs.Bill Shine, named
co-president of Fox News along with Jack Abernethy, will be in charge of
programming at Fox News and Fox Business Network
The network also announced that its longtime chief financial officer, Mark Kranz, was stepping down.
The
moves provide Fox News with a leadership structure for the time being
as the network navigates an election season and an uncertain future,
while also dealing with the departure of Mr. Ailes, who helped Mr.
Murdoch start the network 20 years ago but left after sexual harassment
allegations by the former anchor Gretchen Carlson.
Mr.
Shine, who has been with Fox since shortly after the channel debuted in
1996, is a favored figure among some veteran anchors, including Sean
Hannity, who first recommended him to Mr. Ailes for a job. A Long Island
native, Mr. Shine cut his teeth at the network producing Mr. Hannity’s
program and working closely with personalities like Bill O’Reilly. His
appointment on Friday was widely viewed as a sign of continuity at a
chaotic time in the newsroom.
Investigators
from the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison who are
looking into the allegations against Mr. Ailes are also examining
whether other executives knew of alleged improper behavior by him and failed to act on it.
Mr.
Shine’s name, along with those of other executives, surfaced in the
accounts of three women who recently came forward to say they had been
harassed by Mr. Ailes while at Fox News and described a culture of
intimidation at the network. Through a spokeswoman, Mr. Shine has denied
any wrongdoing. Mr. Ailes has denied all of the allegations against
him.
“Bill
Shine has developed and produced a signature prime time that has
dominated the cable news landscape for 14 of his 20 years with Fox
News,” Mr. Murdoch said in a statement. “His leadership and keen eye for
programming has played a fundamental role in the success of both Fox
News and Fox Business Network.”
Mr.
Murdoch, also the executive chairman of 21st Century Fox, Fox News’s
parent company, is expected to stay in the role of the network’s chief
executive until at least through the presidential election in November.
He has been active at the network since taking over the role previously
held by Mr. Ailes and has become a regular fixture at news meetings. He
has also taken over Mr. Ailes’s second-floor corner office.
Mr.
Murdoch said that Mr. Abernethy’s appointment “will ensure continued
growth of Fox News and Fox Business Network for generations to come.”
Fox
News also announced that Suzanne Scott had been named executive vice
president of programming and would oversee the network’s daytime and
prime-time opinion shows. Jay Wallace will remain in charge of the news
division. Ms. Scott and Mr. Wallace will report to Mr. Shine.
