Cesar Conde is not the typical leader of a major news institution.
A Wharton-trained executive who revived the fortunes of Telemundo and sits on the boards of Pepsi and Walmart, Mr. Conde had limited experience in journalism when, in 2020, he became the chairman of NBC’s sprawling news division, including MSNBC, CNBC, and franchises like “Meet the Press,” “Nightly News” and the “Today” show.
Now he is trying to navigate the biggest crisis of his tenure: a journalistic firestorm that prompted an open revolt among his stars and has fueled internal questions about just how neatly Mr. Conde’s corporate experience and ambitions gel with the unique challenges of the news business.
The rapid hiring and dismissal of Ronna McDaniel, the former chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, stunned network journalists over the past week, with many asking why Mr. Conde and his deputies had brought on someone who had vilified NBC and advanced former President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
The blowback facing Mr. Conde, 50, a former fellow in George W. Bush’s White House who prides himself on having an even-keeled, nonpartisan reputation, is coming from both sides of the aisle. Left-leaning fans of MSNBC felt betrayed, and Republican officials are mocking NBC as biased, even threatening to bar its reporters from this summer’s nominating convention.
At elite retreats like the Aspen Ideas Festival, Mr. Conde, who declined to be interviewed, likes to say he runs “the largest news organization in the country.” As he heads into the scrutiny of a general-election campaign, he is discovering just how hard that job can be.
Two of Mr. Conde’s newsroom leaders — Rebecca Blumenstein, the NBC News president of editorial, and Carrie Budoff Brown, who oversees political coverage — recommended Ms. McDaniel to Mr. Conde; Rashida Jones, the MSNBC president, also signed off, according to two people familiar with the discussions. Mr. Conde trusted the judgment of his top journalists, the people said.
“I want to personally apologize to our team members who felt we let them down,” Mr. Conde said in a staff memo earlier this week. “While this was a collective recommendation by some members of our leadership team, I approved it and take full responsibility.”
A longtime fixture of media power lists, Mr. Conde is well-regarded by other executives in the industry. He was a high-ranking leader at Univision before joining NBCUniversal in 2013 and orchestrating a turnaround at Telemundo by investing in soccer and prime-time scripted series, most notably “narconovelas,” or crime dramas about drug cartels.
He also invested in journalism. Telemundo landed Mr. Trump’s first interview of his presidency with a Spanish-language outlet and cosponsored Republican and Democratic primary debates. Ratings for Telemundo’s flagship newscast soared.
His performance impressed executives at NBC’s parent company, Comcast. In May 2020, Jeff Shell, then the NBCUniversal chief executive, put Mr. Conde in charge of the NBC News Group, replacing a veteran newsman, Andrew Lack.
Privately, Mr. Shell acknowledged that Mr. Conde had a different background from his predecessor.
According to two people familiar with his remarks, Mr. Shell said that there are three types of leaders who run news organizations. “Journalists, politicians and businesspeople,” Mr. Shell said, the two people recalled. “Cesar is a politician.”
Under Mr. Conde’s watch, the news division has expanded its digital efforts, and MSNBC and NBC’s flagship TV programs have continued to draw good ratings. On Friday, Mike Cavanagh, the president of Comcast, NBC’s parent company, praised Mr. Conde’s stewardship “during a time of transition” in media. “The performance of the News Group speaks to his great leadership especially during challenging times,” he said in a statement.
Some of Mr. Conde’s moves raised eyebrows in the NBC newsroom.
He arranged for lists of on-air guests to be forwarded to his office, so he could drop by and greet influential and powerful visitors. When George W. Bush was interviewed on “Today” in 2021 by his daughter, Jenna Bush Hager, Mr. Conde asked his office to forward his biography to the former president in advance, according to two people familiar with the arrangement. (Mr. Conde often speaks admiringly about his time working as a fellow for then-Secretary of State Colin Powell under Mr. Bush.)
Mr. Conde also retained his board seats at Pepsi and Walmart, from which he earned more than $640,000 in compensation last year, according to financial filings. News leaders usually strive to avoid even the appearance of conflict of interest. Mr. Conde has said he recuses himself from any editorial decisions involving the two companies. (He is also a trustee at the Aspen Institute, which sponsors the Ideas Festival; in 2021, under Mr. Conde, NBC News Group signed a partnership to be the institute’s media partner.)
Inside 30 Rockefeller Plaza, part of the concern stems from a jigsawlike management structure that Mr. Conde announced last year. He said at the time that the change was necessary to “seize the growth opportunities in front of us” and adapt to rapidly changing viewer habits and business models in news.
Under Mr. Conde’s plan, Ms. Blumenstein, the president of NBC News editorial, oversees “Meet the Press” and NBCNews.com, but not “NBC Nightly News” or NBC News Now, the network’s streaming service. Her purview is separate from the “Today” franchise. And MSNBC and CNBC are siloed in different divisions.
On Thursday, Ms. Blumenstein, who is a former editor at The New York Times, visited NBC’s Washington bureau to try to quell some of her journalists’ concerns.
In a 40-minute meeting — along with one-on-one sessions with prominent reporters — she told staff that NBC leaders had good intentions in hiring Ms. McDaniel, and urged the newsroom to move forward, according to a person briefed on her remarks. Ms. Blumenstein also expressed surprise that her visit to the bureau had leaked to other news organizations before she even arrived, the person said.
Ms. Blumenstein expressed support for Ms. Brown, the head of political coverage who was closely involved in Ms. McDaniel’s hiring, according to two people familiar with her comments. At the start of the revolt against Ms. McDaniel, Ms. Brown spoke with a Republican Party operative about marshaling public support for the former party chair. That conversation, reported by Puck, raised deep concerns in the Washington bureau that several journalists there said had yet to be adequately addressed.
In an email to The Times on Friday, Ms. Blumenstein wrote: “I came to NBC News because of Cesar’s rare blend of deep media experience and business acumen. One will not find a greater supporter of original journalism on so many mediums.”
Asked to elaborate on the process behind Ms. McDaniel’s hiring, Ms. Blumenstein deferred to the language in Mr. Conde’s memo, in which he called the hiring a collective recommendation that he approved. “As I’ve said to our team, we should not have brought her on,” she wrote of Ms. McDaniel.
Ms. Blumenstein did not respond to questions about Ms. Brown’s interaction with the Republican operative, or how she planned to address the staff concerns about Ms. Brown.
Tom Llamas, an NBC News anchor and senior correspondent whom Mr. Conde helped recruit from ABC, said in an interview on Friday that he admired Mr. Conde’s commitment to the organization.
“When you meet Cesar he’ll tell you he’s not a journalist. But I can tell you he’s a guy who wants to make sure quality journalism doesn’t disappear,” Mr. Llamas said.
Asked about the events surrounding Ms. McDaniel, Mr. Llamas replied: “It happened, leadership dealt with it, Cesar put out a note, we’re moving on. They acknowledge what happened, and how they handled it, and hopefully it’s going to make us stronger.”
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