Big Move Coming for Shep Smith at Fox News

Fox News anchor Shepard Smith is leaving his 7 p.m. ET timeslot to take on a larger role heading up the network's new breaking news division.

AP

Starting this fall, the new division, with Smith as the main anchor and managing editor, will have the capability to break into any Fox News programming anytime throughout the day, a network statement said.

“Shep is a premier journalist and one of the finest newsmen of the modern era. He will exemplify the ethos that Fox News is when and where the news is, as it happens, no longer bound by a traditional evening format conceived in the 1960s," Fox News chairman Roger Ailes said in the statement.

A new studio, known as the "Fox News Deck," will incorporate "real-time news feeds, digital media newsgathering and social media utilizing advanced, state-of-the-art technology."

“Learning and reporting the news has been my passion for 25 years. I'm thrilled that Roger is trusting and empowering my team and me to bring the news to our viewers as it happens throughout the day and night. Roger’s forward-looking approach to anchoring and reporting will continue to solidify FNC’s position as the number one cable news network in the country,” Smith said.

The Associated Press was the first to report the news.

Smith will remain in the 3 p.m. ET hour under the renamed and revamped "Shepard Smith Reporting."

It's the first announced primetime programming shuffle since the network said in July that daytime anchor Megyn Kelly would be moving to evenings. Kelly has been rumored to be taking Sean Hannity's 9 p.m. slot.

There was no announcement about who would replace Smith in his 7 p.m. timeslot, or about the rest of the Fox News primetime lineup.

This post has been updated.

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