The only black woman to lead a prime-time news program in the United States, Phillippe has won praise for maintaining her composure as host during the hour-long show’s heated airtime.
Politicians and celebrities attend Pastor Jesse Jackson’s funeral
Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Bill Clinton attended a memorial service celebrating the life of civil rights activist Reverend Jesse Jackson in Chicago.
Abby Phillip prefers to live a quiet life.
She bakes homemade sourdough bread and dreams of attending culinary school. Her favorite dish is Martha Stewart’s beef short ribs. Philip is eager to play the piano again, a hobby he started when he was five years old. Now 37, she spends any free time she can get away from the bar-hopping social scene of New York City.
On a recent morning in March, she compared her role managing a rotating panel of liberals and conservatives on her sometimes conflicting CNN show to her off-air priorities: raising her 4-year-old daughter, Naomi.
“One of the things you learn very early on is that when you match your energy with someone else’s energy, things get out of control,” Philip told USA TODAY from his home in New York last month. “So sometimes you have to calmly get people’s attention.”
“NewsNight” first aired in 2023, two years into President Joe Biden’s term, and quickly found an online audience for panelists across the political spectrum. She hosts an additional version of “Table for Five” on Saturday mornings. The only black woman to lead a prime-time news program in the United States, Phillippe has won praise for remaining calm during the hour-long show’s heated airtime.
Philip also makes similar criticisms. Conservative media personality Megyn Kelly and podcaster Katie Miller, who is married to President Trump’s immigration czar Stephen Miller, are among those who have the right to label Philippe biased. “I’m not a Republican official, I’m not a Democratic official,” Philip said in an on-air conversation with Miller, accusing the host of making biased statements during a debate on free speech.
Dubbed “the next CNN” by the New York Times, Philippe rose to fame after reporting for Politico, the Washington Post and ABC News. She grew up in Bowie, Maryland, about 40 minutes from the White House, and joined CNN in 2017 to cover the first year of President Donald Trump’s first term. By 2020, she had become a star on the network, hosting that year’s Democratic presidential debates and later adding deeper context to CNN’s coverage of Trump’s tumultuous exit from the White House.
“Americans with different perspectives” talk to Philip
Six years later, Phillip joined The Root publisher Ashley Allison on the April 8 issue of “NewsNight.” Republican advisor Brad Todd. former Democratic National Committee spokesperson Xochitl Hinojosa; right-wing strategist Sharmichael Singleton; and journalist Lina Ninan.
“Americans with different points of view don’t talk to each other, but here they do,” Phillip said in the prerecorded opening, as he does at the beginning of each show.
The White House’s ceasefire with Iran was on the roundtable menu. Ashley Allison, former national national director for the 2020 Biden campaign, expressed her opinion on President Trump’s handling of the war.
“Everyday Americans, myself included, will never know about intimate war plans, or at least they don’t need to know unless we accidentally signal them,” Allison said.
That last mention concerns Pentagon Secretary Pete Hegseth and others with whom the Trump administration used an encrypted messaging service last year to discuss covert military operations in Yemen, a chat that also happened to include Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg.
“We’re not supposed to know the war plan,” Allison continued, arguing that Trump’s original reasons for entering the Iran conflict are unclear. “You had to include that, right?” joked Republican strategist Mr. Singleton, referring to the signal hue. “I did. I’ve kept the receipt,” Allison replied.
While the show has produced lighter moments for political junkies, such as Allison and Singleton’s banter, occasional clips of arguments between panelists have made the show a troubling must-see for virtual viewers who casually watch the fights on social media.
“It’s important to tell the truth honestly.”
The content is reminiscent of the match between Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Rosie O’Donnell on “The View.” The daytime show had a conflicting profile during the George W. Bush administration, but “Newsnight” debuted as President Trump revived his political career.
Scott Jennings, a popular conservative commentator on the show, made headlines in December after Bakary Sellers, a former Democratic state representative from South Carolina, gave him a friendly nudge on the arm during a tough debate with President Trump about gas prices. “Don’t touch me,” Jennings shot back.
Philippe has frequently challenged Jennings, but his most notable rebuke was against fitness trainer Jillian Michaels last August. During a discussion about the Smithsonian Institution, Phillip rebuked Michaels for spreading false claims about America’s history of slavery.
By claiming that “less than 2% of white Americans own slaves,” the former “Biggest Loser” coach was parroting a long-standing claim often circulated online that misrepresents slave ownership in America.
Phillip interjected into the discussion and said he was “surprised” that Michaels was “trying to litigate who was and wasn’t a beneficiary of slavery.” When Phillippe asked Michaels what he meant by his comments, the former TV health guru replied, “The whole thing is like, ‘Oh, no, no, no. This is all because white people are to blame,'” regarding the museum’s exhibits.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sSBYEAx9Fs
In a lengthy statement emailed to USA TODAY by a spokesperson, Michaels said Phillippe incorrectly portrayed the exchange on air. Phillip told USA TODAY that conflicts like the one involving Michaels are no laughing matter.
“In moments like that, it’s important to just tell the truth,” Philip said. CNN noted in an April 7 press release that the show was nominated for a News & Documentary Emmy Award in the Slavery Debate category.
Philip talks about ‘keeping calm’ in the midst of chaos
Philip’s calm demeanor may be the reason for this program’s high ratings. “The show is heated, there’s no denying that,” Singleton said in an email on April 6, but added, “Abby’s ability to lead the discussion, even when it veers off the beaten track, speaks to her agility as a host.”
“It helps that I’m a person who doesn’t do what everyone else is doing at the table and stays calm…that’s how I actually live in the world,” Philip said.
Reminiscing about the first time she met Phillip in makeup on CNN before “Newsnight” existed, Alison said, “The reason Abby can do on the air what she does on the air is because she does it off the air.” Philip quickly learned Alison’s name. “She was like, ‘Oh my god, Ashley, how are you doing? How are you doing?’
“My interaction with her from the very first time is how she shows up on the show,” Alison continued. “She hears people. She sees people. She pushes people when she thinks there might be factual inaccuracies in what they’re saying.”
True friendship that transcends party lines
Behind the scenes, friendships developed between the panelists. Phillippe pointed to Sellers and Kentucky native Jennings, her most frequent and popular guests, as examples.
Jennings was a key aide to former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell years before the seven-term Kentucky Republican became special to President Trump. Sellers, a Democrat, stepped into the network after losing a tight 2014 race for South Carolina lieutenant governor. Sellers, a CNN commentator since 2015, wrote a memoir about the rural South, “My Vanishing Country.”
They are both Southerners and have formed a bond as fathers. “Some people think it’s not real,” Philip said. “I think that’s real life, because I think we all have friends and family members who have a different perspective.
“I’m friends with Scott Jennings,” Sellers said in a phone interview. “I think the first thing we talk about when we meet is family…You understand the pressures we go through…how the outside world views you sometimes.”
Sellers said, “At the end of the day, there’s a level of decency to what we stand for, but while it may not always get through to our viewers, those who know us know that our mutual respect is unwavering.”
“Is she perfect?”
After going on tour to promote the book he wrote last year, “A Dream Deferred: Jesse Jackson and the Fight for Black Political Power,” Philippe is settling into a quieter off-screen life in New York. Philip visited the late civil rights icon’s hometown of Greenville, South Carolina, to reflect on his illustrious life.
She mined the origins of Jackson’s childhood in the segregated Jim Crow South and his political rise as the first black man to launch a major presidential campaign. After Jackson’s death in February, Philip attended his funeral in Chicago on March 6.
“I was shocked that he had so many different chapters that he risked leaving generations of people unaware of who he was,” Philip said.
The same knack for understanding the disconnected context of political commentary helped her carve an unusual path in Washington for the first time.
It is rare for someone like Philip to become a featured talent on a broadcast like “NewsNight.” There is no one else like her, a Black woman, and no one else in her age group, except for her CNN counterpart and personal friend Caitlan Collins, 34.
“The reality is that she represents a lot of black women, and I think she’s doing a great job,” said Eva Thompson Greenwell, a journalism professor at Northwestern University who researches black women behind the scenes in the television industry.
“Is she perfect? Nobody’s perfect, right?” Thompson-Greenwell said.
Earlier this month, Philip was joined by a panel that included Axios media reporter Sarah Fisher; Neera Tanden, former senior adviser to Biden; Liberal YouTuber Lee McGowan. and Peter Meyer, heir to an American supermarket chain and former Republican congressman from Michigan.
The “Newsnight” anchor forced the show into a commercial break after McGowan got into an altercation with another guest, Noah Rothman, author of “Unjust: Social Justice and the Ruin of America.” There was an ad pause for peace.
A calmer Philippe then began the next segment, continuing to make history in the same area she has spent years helping others understand.
