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NewsNation is an American cable news network owned by Nexstar Media Group. Known for most of its history as Superstation WGN before becoming WGN America in 2008, it relaunched on March 1, 2021, as a cable news network named after its flagship news program. The channel's relaunch came as part of a planned expansion of its news programming. The channel continued to carry some entertainment programming held over from WGN America on weekends, but this was discontinued in July 2024. After being acquired by Nexstar, The Hill and broadcast network The CW have collaborated with NewsNation on content.
In September 2018, the channel, then WGN America, was received by approximately 80 million households that subscribed to a pay television service throughout the United States (or 62.7% of households with at least one television set).
The channel has publicly claimed to be Centrism, but in 2021, several NewsNation staff left the network citing concerns they were being pushed by management to lean to right-wing politics in news coverage.
As the national feed of WGN-TV, the channel broadcast a variety of programming seen on the Chicago signal, including sports (mainly Chicago Cubs and White Sox baseball, as well as Chicago Bulls basketball games); locally originated news, children's, religious and public affairs programs; movies; and syndicated series. Through the 1980s, the WGN local and national feeds maintained nearly identical program schedules, aside from some sporting events that were restricted to the Chicago-area signal under league policy restrictions. After the January 1990 re-imposition of federal syndication exclusivity regulations, programming between the two feeds increasingly deviated as the WGN national feed incorporated alternative syndicated programming to replace shows on the WGN-TV schedule that were subjected to market-exclusivity claims by individual television stations, and some local programs that the national feed chose not to clear; particularly from the late 2000s onward, as the WGN Chicago signal began expanding its local news programming and added lifestyle programs to its schedule.
On December 13, 2014, WGN America was converted by Tribune into a conventional basic cable network, at which time cable providers within the Chicago market started to offer it alongside its existing local carriage on satellite providers DirecTV and Dish Network. Simulcasts of WGN-TV's Chicago-originated local newscasts, news specials and public affairs programs, special events and sports telecasts – with the exception of a one-hour simulcast of WGN-TV's morning news program that was carried early weekday mornings during the transitional period – immediately ceased being shown on a national basis the day prior, while WGN-TV maintained a separate schedule of local and syndicated programs exclusively catering to the Chicago market. The channel began to focus squarely on acquired programming, including shows held over from its superstation era, and by 2015, began to incorporate a limited schedule of original drama and reality series.
During December 2020 and January 2021, Nexstar reached carriage agreements that added WGN America to virtual multichannel television providers YouTube TV (reached on December 1), FuboTV (reached on December 11), Hulu (reached on December 18), Sling TV (reached on December 24, through a broader agreement with Sling parent Dish Network which ended a three-week impasse in which the satellite provider lost access to Nexstar's broadcast stations) and Vidgo (reached on January 14) to expand the channel beyond its existing wireline and satellite distribution footprint, and increase exposure for NewsNation. (AT&T TV had already carried the channel since October 2019).
NewsNation was developed under the management of Sean Compton, who was promoted to executive vice president of WGN America upon completion of the Nexstar purchase, and former WGN-TV news director Jennifer Lyons, who was reassigned by Nexstar to serve as WGN America's vice president of news. However, since its launch, NewsNation has been accused of having a rightward tilt due to its guests and for hiring former Fox News Channel chief and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Bill Shine as a consultant. The news director and managing editor quit following the disclosure of Shine's role in February 2021. Lyons announced her resignation in March amid the controversy and continued low ratings. Amid dissension from NewsNation staffers, Nexstar's CEO affirmed the schedule to convert NewsNation into an "all-news, talk, and opinion" channel by 2023.
In May 2021, Nexstar hired Michael Corn, the senior executive producer of Good Morning America, as its news director to replace Lyons. Corn then named Fox News vice president Cherie Grzech as managing editor. Later that year, NewsNation premiered more opinion programming hosted by cable news veterans Leland Vittert and Dan Abrams, as well as a morning show hosted by former ABC News presenter Adrienne Bankert.
On October 3, 2022, former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, who was terminated for advising his brother, New York governor Andrew Cuomo, about how to deal with various scandals, joined the network with an evening program called Cuomo to replace NewsNation Prime week nights, thus fully converting evening programming to personality-driven opinion and analysis shows. News contributors include former Fox News host Bill O'Reilly, former White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, former White House press secretary Sean Spicer and The Washington Post columnist George Will.
On April 1, 2023, overnight drama series and infomercials were replaced with repeats of its evening talk and analysis shows; then on April 24, NewsNation permanently switched to a 24-hour all-news schedule on weekdays consisting of a four-hour rolling afternoon news block, NewsNation Now (replacing crime dramas in that slot), and an hour-long political news show, The Hill (a broadcast extension of the co-owned publication, replacing an hour of the early evening newscast NewsNation Rush Hour). The network also unveiled a new studio at its New York City bureau (located in the Daily News Building in Midtown, Manhattan, where co-operated CW affiliate WPIX, which also christened a separate new studio on that date, operates). Syndicated scripted series acquired under the WGN America brand that remain on the schedule (such as Blue Bloods and Last Man Standing) and time-brokered programs continued to air on weekends outside of prime time.
On June 1, 2024, NewsNation expanded its all-news format to weekends, thereby completing its four-year transition into a 24/7 cable news network. NewsNation had gradually replaced non-news programming in weekend morning and daytime slots (consisting of religious and paid programming in the early morning, and marathon blocks of Blue Bloods—its last remaining entertainment program, which completed its syndication contract the week before the transition—in the late morning and afternoon) with weekend editions of Morning in America, rolling news programs NewsNation Live and NewsNation Now, and the weekly political talk show The Hill Sunday during the first half of 2024.
After seeing an increase in viewership during its coverage of the disappearance and killing of Gabby Petito in 2021, NewsNation launched a new series called Missing in America which focused on Missing person.
Beginning in September 2024, NewsNation began to carry overflow CW Sports from co-owned broadcast network The CW, specifically airing the start of the second game of a college football doubleheader under the CW Football Saturday banner after the first game ran well over its scheduled timeslot or airing the start of the college football game after NASCAR Xfinity Series races run over their scheduled time slot. Such usage of news channels for overflow weekend sports content is not unprecedented, as Fox has similarly used co-owned Fox Business for this purpose.
On November 6, 2024, NewsNation and its partner Decision Desk HQ were the first to call the 2024 United States presidential election for Donald Trump.
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