Back in November, anti-Trump Fox News contributors Jonah Goldberg and Stephen Hayes left Fox News.
They said they quit because Tucker Carlson’s documentaries exposed what really happened on January 6th.
The New York Times reported at the time:
The trailer for Tucker Carlson’s special about the Jan. 6 mob at the Capitol landed online on Oct. 27, and that night Jonah Goldberg sent a text to his business partner, Stephen Hayes: “I’m tempted just to quit Fox over this.”
“I’m game,” Mr. Hayes replied. “Totally outrageous. It will lead to violence. Not sure how we can stay.”
The full special, “Patriot Purge,” appeared on Fox’s online subscription streaming service days later. And last week, the two men, both paid Fox News contributors, finalized their resignations from the network.
In some ways, their departures should not be surprising: It’s simply part of the new right’s mopping up operation in the corners of conservative institutions that still house pockets of resistance to Donald J. Trump’s control of the Republican Party. Mr. Goldberg, a former National Review writer, and Mr. Hayes, a former Weekly Standard writer, were stars of the pre-Trump conservative movement. They clearly staked out their positions in 2019 when they founded The Dispatch, an online publication that they described as “a place that thoughtful readers can come for conservative, fact-based news and commentary.” It now has nearly 30,000 paying subscribers.
One of them is now heading to NBC.
Chuck Todd said in a statement that Hayes will be joining NBC as a network contributor.
Months after Stephen Hayes quit Fox News over Tucker Carlson’s conspiratorial rhetoric about the Jan. 6 riots, the conservative author and pundit has landed at NBC News.
“I’ve known and worked with Steve Hayes on and off for nearly 25 years,” Meet the Press anchor Chuck Todd said in a Friday morning statement announcing Hayes’ new role as a network contributor. “He is a principled reporter and analyst who always puts truth and facts above emotion and sentiment.”
Hayes was a Fox News contributor for 12 years and was once a writer for the now-defunct Weekly Standard before co-founding The Dispatch, a center-right website offering an anti-Trump alternative for conservative audiences. He will make his first appearance as an NBC contributor on Sunday morning during Meet the Press, a show on which he has frequently appeared in years past.
Hayes did not immediately respond to The Daily Beast’s request for additional comment on his new job.