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Vargas leaving ABC


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She’s leaving in May. From her note to staff, sounds like this news leaked a little earlier than she hoped — she says she preferred to make the announcement after the holidays. ABC News president James Goldstein wrote a very nice note about her.

 

I’m curious where she’ll end up.

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Only way she goes to nbc is solo anchor dateline and become a special correspondent or Sunday today anchor if willie goes back to weekday today. CNN would be more of the choice for her

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Nope. Elizabeth joined ABC News in 1996 as the newsreader on Good Morning America. I still remember Elizabeth filling in for Bryant, Katie and the rapist on the Today Show.

She's been at ABC for more than 20 years? Good run.

 

For whatever reason thought she jumped from NBC more like during the mid 2000s.

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It was actually all a bit more complicated...

 

Gibson and Vargas alternated the most in the weeks after Peter’s death. Gibson was offered the position, but under the condition that he anchor only until the end of 2007 and then hand the broadcast over to the team of Vargas and Woodruff. He refused that deal because he wanted to anchor throughout the 2008 presidential election. At that point, he decided he would just anchor GMA for the remainder of his contract and retire in 2007. At the same time, ABC pulled him from the WNT rotation and then had Vargas and Woodruff rotate and even tested them co-anchoring a few times.

 

ABC then offered Vargas and Woodruff the job. Woodruff was injured weeks into it and Vargas announced she was pregnant. ABC then rotated in Gibson and Diane Sawyer to sit alongside Vargas to offer some stability again to the program (and because it was now February sweeps and the network needed familiar faces at the desk). That rotation lasted for a little while until Vargas became the de facto solo anchor of World News Tonight, although the program still beared her and Woodruff’s names.

 

A few weeks down the line, WNT ratings slipped behind CBS for the first time in decades and the prospect of a Katie Couric-led CBS Evening News is on the horizon. ABC brass are panicking. May sweeps is approaching and so is the “upfront” season when networks sell themselves to advertisers.

 

Gibson was then approached again to help right the ship. He made it clear this time that he would do it and serve until he was ready to leave and he would not do it as a co-anchor job — nothing against Vargas but for a 22 minute program with little room for banter, it didn’t make sense to him to have two anchors.

 

As Vargas revealed last year in her 20/20 special that covered her battle with alcoholism, she was essentially fired from World News Tonight for the sinking ratings but allowed to leave under the guise of needing to rest due to her pregnancy and focus on her family. The job that ABC promised her would be there after she gave birth was no longer hers.

 

Gibson then took over and, as he said would, left on his own terms in 2009.

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As unstable as all of that was, I think they made the right decision. With neither co-anchor going to be around, permanently installing Gibson was the right choice. That said, I respect the risk they took in initially going with the co-anchors, and ultimately, none of their individual repurations suffered.

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Aside from her personal challenges, Elizabeth always struck me as a highly capable journalist and consummate professional. I always felt she was being underutilized as the once-a-week murder mystery anchor. Who knows if she preferred that, though. I thought she was excellent on GMA next to George during Robin's treatment and recovery.

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Amy Robach will replace Elizabeth Vargas, according to reports in Page Six and the LA Times on December 22. Page Six says Robach will juggle both "20/20" and "GMA". Also, FTV Live reports today that Vargas was pushed into retirement as part of Disney's cost-cutting measures.

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