Campbell Brown Leaving CNN

The anchor of CNN’s 8 PM ET broadcast has reportedly had enough of her nightly ratings war with FOX News’ Bill O’Reilly and Keith Olbermann of MSNBC; she’s asked to be released from her contract with the network, The New York Times said Tuesday.

Brown’s departure, first reported by the blog Mediaite, comes as the network has suffered deep losses in its prime-time viewership since its 2008 political ratings surge. A source familiar with the situation confirmed that Brown has been in talks for some time with the network about making a change. She sought to have her program moved an hour earlier, to the time slot anchored by Lou Dobbs, until he abruptly left the network, but that hour went to John King.

Brown made a big splash when she joined CNN from NBC, but was not able to draw ratings on a par with the opinion-oriented shows hosted by her rivals. So far this year, her viewership is down 38% compared with the same period last year.

Campbell Brown will step down as CNN’s 8PM news anchor due to low ratings, the NY Times has confirmed.

“The simple fact is that not enough people want to watch my program, and I owe it to myself and to CNN to get out of the way so that CNN can try something else. CNN will have to figure out what that is,” said in in a statement.

Ms. Brown said it was her decision to leave, and that she would remain the anchor of the 8 p.m. hour on CNN during “the transition.”

In a lengthy and heartfelt statement, she wrote, “Simply put, the ratings for my program are not where I would like them to be.”

A source with knowledge of the situation tells Mediaite Brown made the request months ago – and before all the ‘how to fix CNN’ articles began rolling out. We hear she originally lobbied for the 7pmET opening, with the thinking the show would work better at an earlier hour (and without the Bill O’Reilly/Keith Olbermann competition). The plan was denied by CNN, she later asked for her release. (Separate rumors circulated around this time about what Brown’s status with CNN might be if her husband, Dan Senor, ran for Senate in New York – he didn’t.)

Brown’s ratings have been consistently better than the previous program in the timeslot, anchored by Paula Zahn, but have struggled when compared to the cable news competition. Since John King took over the timeslot before, Brown’s ratings have fallen even further, although the program’s lowest total viewer and demo averages came just before King took over.