''The Beat with Ari Melber'' is an American news and politics program hosted by
Ari Melber
Ari Naftali Melber (born March 31, 1980) is an American attorney and journalist who is the chief legal correspondent for MSNBC and host of ''The Beat with Ari Melber.''
The show premiered on July 24, 2017, and became the "longest-running" show ...
, who is the chief legal correspondent for the network
MSNBC
MSNBC (originally the Microsoft National Broadcasting Company) is an American news-based pay television cable channel. It is owned by NBCUniversala subsidiary of Comcast. Headquartered in New York City, it provides news coverage and political ...
. It airs weekdays at 6 PM
ET.
Guest hosts for the series include
Mehdi Hasan
Mehdi Raza Hasan (born July 1979) is a British-American political journalist, broadcaster and author of Indian descent.
Hasan has been the host of ''The Mehdi Hasan Show'' on Peacock since October 2020 and on MSNBC since February 2021.
In 2 ...
,
Jason Johnson,
Alicia Menendez,
Katie Phang
Kathleen Suzanne Phang (born August 1, 1975) is an American attorney, legal analyst, and television host. She hosts ''The Katie Phang Show'', which airs on the weekends on MSNBC and Thursdays to Fridays on Peacock.
Early life
Phang was born ...
, and
Ayman Mohyeldin
Ayman ( ar, أيمن, also spelled as Aiman, Aimen, Aymen, or Eymen in the Latin alphabet) is an Arabic masculine given name. It is derived from the Arabic Semitic root () for ''right'', and literally means ''righteous'', ''he who is on the right'' ...
.
Format
The show features news reporting, one-on-one interviews, panels, and special reports by the anchor. The show includes a "Fallback Friday" segment every Friday.
History
''The Beat with Ari Melber'' was announced after
Greta Van Susteren
Greta Conway Van Susteren (born June 11, 1954) is an American commentator, lawyer, and television news anchor for Newsmax TV. She was previously on CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC. She hosted Fox News's ''On the Record w/ Greta Van Susteren'' for 14 ...
's program ''
For the Record with Greta'' ended. The network tapped Melber as one of its "most valuable utility players" for anchoring the 6pm slot, according to the
Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. new ...
, an effort to shore up an hour when MSNBC has historically drawn less viewers, trailing cable stars
Bret Baier
William Bret Baier ( ; born August 4, 1970) is the host of ''Special Report with Bret Baier'' on the Fox News Channel and the chief political correspondent for Fox. He previously worked as the network's Chief White House Correspondent and Penta ...
and
Wolf Blitzer
Wolf Isaac Blitzer (born March 22, 1948) is an American journalist, television news anchor, and author who has been a CNN reporter since 1990, and who currently serves as one of the principal anchors at the network. He is the host of ''The Situa ...
, who host the 6 p.m. shows on
Fox News
The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is o ...
and
CNN. Upon its debut, it was part of MSNBC's evening ratings surge among
key demographic
The key demographic or target demographic is a term in commercial broadcasting that refers to the most desirable demographic group to a given advertiser. Key demographics vary by outlet, time of day, and programming type, but they are generally co ...
s on
cable television
Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with bro ...
, and went on to draw a larger nightly audience than any hour of CNN.
''The Beat with Ari Melber'' has been noted for its reporting on
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dust ...
's role in elections and journalism.
Mediaite
Mediaite is a news website focusing on politics and the media.Howard PolskinHow the Washington Examiner became a traffic monster ''Columbia Journalism Review'' (May 15, 2020). Founded by Dan Abrams, it is part of the Abrams Media Network.
Conte ...
, an
American Media
Mass media in the United States consist of several types of media: television, radio, cinema, newspapers, magazines, and web sites. The U.S. also has a strong music industry. New York City, Manhattan in particular, and to a lesser extent ...
publication, wrote about its coverage of Facebook's role in the Philippines election, noting "host Ari Melber has carved out an important niche as arguably the leading critic of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in all of television."
Notable interviews Melber has conducted include
U.S. Senators
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and power ...
Kamala Harris
Kamala Devi Harris ( ; born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who is the 49th vice president of the United States. She is the first female vice president and the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history, as well ...
,
Elizabeth Warren
Elizabeth Ann Warren ( née Herring; born June 22, 1949) is an American politician and former law professor who is the senior United States senator from Massachusetts, serving since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party and regarded as ...
,
Jeff Merkley
Jeffrey Alan Merkley (born October 24, 1956) is an American politician serving as the junior United States senator from Oregon since 2009. A member of the Democratic Party, Merkley served as the 64th speaker of the Oregon House of Representati ...
,
Richard Blumenthal
Richard Blumenthal (; born February 13, 1946) is an American lawyer and politician who is the senior United States senator from Connecticut, a seat he has held since 2011. A member of the Democratic Party, he is one of the wealthiest members of ...
,
Dick Durbin
Richard Joseph Durbin (born November 21, 1944) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the senior United States senator from Illinois, a seat he has held since 1997. A member of the Democratic Party, Durbin has served as the Senate De ...
,
Mark Warner
Mark Robert Warner (born December 15, 1954) is an American businessman and politician serving as the senior United States senator from Virginia, a seat he has held since 2009. A member of the Democratic Party, Warner served as the 69th gov ...
, and
Cory Booker
Cory Anthony Booker (born April 27, 1969) is an American politician and attorney who has served as the junior United States senator from New Jersey since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party, Booker is the first African-American U.S. se ...
; Sheriff
Joe Arpaio
Joseph Michael Arpaio (; born June 14, 1932) is an American former law enforcement officer and politician. He served as the 36th Sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona for 24 years, from 1993 to 2017, losing reelection to Democrat Paul Penzone i ...
, who had a newsworthy legal exchange on the show, former White House adviser
Stephen Bannon, former Trump aide
Sam Nunberg, who later credited the interview for his decision to cooperate with
Special Counsel
In the United States, a special counsel (formerly called special prosecutor or independent counsel) is a lawyer appointed to investigate, and potentially prosecute, a particular case of suspected wrongdoing for which a conflict of interest ex ...
Robert Mueller
Robert Swan Mueller III (; born August 7, 1944) is an American lawyer and government official who served as the sixth director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from 2001 to 2013.
A graduate of Princeton University and New York ...
, also
Donald Trump's
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
former lawyer
Michael Cohen has appeared on the show multiple times and musician
Talib Kweli
Talib Kweli Greene (; born October 3, 1975) is an American rapper. He earned recognition early on through his collaboration with fellow Brooklyn rapper Mos Def in 1997, when they formed the group Black Star. Kweli's musical career continued with ...
, who joined a discussion with
Fat Joe
Joseph Antonio Cartagena (born August 19, 1970), better known by his stage name Fat Joe, is an American rapper from New York City. He began his music career as a member of hip hop group Diggin' in the Crates Crew (D.I.T.C.), then forged a sol ...
and conservative
Bill Kristol
William Kristol (; born December 23, 1952) is an American neoconservative writer. A frequent commentator on several networks including CNN, he was the founder and editor-at-large of the political magazine ''The Weekly Standard''. Kristol is now ...
that ''
Fortune
Fortune may refer to:
General
* Fortuna or Fortune, the Roman goddess of luck
* Luck
* Wealth
* Fortune, a prediction made in fortune-telling
* Fortune, in a fortune cookie
Arts and entertainment Film and television
* ''The Fortune'' (1931 film) ...
'' called "one of the most delightfully diverse panels ever. Really."
The show also features musical and cultural guests, such as 50 Cent, Method Man, Vic Mensa,
French Montana
Karim Kharbouch (Arabic: æɾiːm χɑɾbuːʃ born November 9, 1984), better known by his stage name French Montana, is a Moroccan-American rapper. Born and raised in Morocco, he emigrated to the United States with his family when he was 13. ...
, ''
Black Panther
A black panther is the melanistic colour variant of the leopard (''Panthera pardus'') and the jaguar (''Panthera onca''). Black panthers of both species have excess black pigments, but their typical rosettes are also present. They have been d ...
'' actor
Winston Duke
Winston Duke (born 15 November 1986) is a Tobagonian actor. He made his feature film debut in the role of M'Baku in ''Black Panther'' (2018) and is best known for portraying the character in two films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Duke w ...
, Sean Penn, novelist Alice Walker, Andrew Leon Talley, DJs Stretch Armstrong,
Bobbito Garcia
Robert "Bobbito" Garcia (born September 25, 1966), also known as DJ Cucumber Slice and Kool Bob Love, is an American DJ, author, streetball player, streetball coach, and member of the Rock Steady Crew. He is known as a former co-host of hip hop ...
and
Jay Smooth,
Desus and
The Kid Mero
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...
(who both co-host ''
Desus & Mero''), and the rapper
Havoc
High Altitude Venus Operational Concept (HAVOC) is a set of crewed NASA mission concepts to the planet Venus. All human portions of the missions would be conducted from lighter-than-air craft or from orbit.
Background
Venus is a planet with a r ...
, (who noted Melber quoted his lyrics to explain a legal concept and announced a forthcoming
Mobb Deep
Mobb Deep was an American hip hop duo from New York City. The duo consisted of rappers Prodigy and Havoc. They are considered to be among the principal progenitors of hardcore East Coast hip hopEdwards, Paul, 2009, ''How to Rap: The Art & Scien ...
album in an interview on the show).
Reception
The ''
Detroit Free Press
The ''Detroit Free Press'' is the largest daily newspaper in Detroit, Michigan, US. The Sunday edition is titled the ''Sunday Free Press''. It is sometimes referred to as the Freep (reflected in the paper's web address, www.freep.com). It primari ...
'' named ''The Beat with Ari Melber'' to its "best" TV shows of 2017, noting its reporting "helped untangle the implications of Robert Mueller's Russia investigation, revealing the actual law obscured by the partisan posturing of so many cable news formats."
TVNewser
''Adweek'' is a weekly American advertising trade publication that was first published in 1979. ''Adweek'' covers creativity, client–agency relationships, global advertising, accounts in review, and new campaigns. During this time, it has cover ...
reported that in 2017, ''The Beat with Ari Melber'' "defeated CNN in total viewers this year, and delivered the network's largest yearly audience ever" for its 6pm timeslot. ''Forbes'' reported in 2017, the show delivered "MSNBC's best rating ever for the time slot" and "not just because of an overall Trump Bump bringing a rise in viewership," noting "MSNBC saw total day growth of 38%" in ratings, while "Melber's 6 p.m. slot saw growth of 56%."
TVNewser noted in February 2018, ''The Beat'' and ''
Deadline: White House'' "posted record viewership in MSNBC history for their timeslots," and ''The Beat'' continued its ratings growth in 2018, averaging 1.7 million viewers per night in September 2018—more viewers than CNN's 6pm show and more viewers than every other CNN show in prime time.
References
External links
*
* (''
MSNBC News''; July 29, 2022)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Beat with Ari Melber
2017 American television series debuts
2010s American television news shows
2020s American television news shows
2010s American television talk shows
2020s American television talk shows
MSNBC original programming