Conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh speaks during a news conference at The Queen’s Medical Center in Honolulu, Friday, Jan. 1, 2010. Limbaugh was rushed to the hospital after experiencing chest pains similar to a heart attack Wednesday during a vacation. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)
Cumulus Media, the second-largest broadcaster of AM and FM radio stations in the U.S., plans to drop two high-profile personalities from its lineup by the end of the year: conservative pundits Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.
If the highly rated conservative personalities are removed from the lineup, they will no longer be broadcast from the more than 40 Cumulus channels.
According to Politico, the decision to not renew contracts for Limbaugh and Hannity was related to the cost of the distribution rights and had nothing to do with any comment or political position by either of the two men.
Nothing is final yet, and it’s not known whether other broadcasters would sign a contract to syndicate the Limbaugh or Hannity radio programs. Premiere Networks, a division of Clear Channel Communications and the distributor of both programs, is also reportedly prepared to stream the programs on stations in the markets where they are currently signed with Cumulus.
Robert Unmacht, a communications industry expert at the media group iN3 Partners, told the New York Daily News that “Cumulus prefers to use its own talent, and Clear Channel is happy to bring Premiere talent in-house.”
Many news reports say this is not the first time Clear Channel and Cumulus have had a disagreement over cost, and according to an unnamed Politico source, “Cumulus is known to drive a hard bargain on costs, and Clear Channel is known to seek top dollar for big names.”
While the two media empires have “come to the brink before during contract negotiations,” a source told Politico that “Clear Channel was unlikely to reduce the cost for distribution rights to a level that would satisfy Cumulus.”
Neither Limbaugh nor Hannity has yet commented on the issue, and on Sunday, a Cumulus spokesman released a statement saying the company is “not in a position to comment about negotiations with talent under contract, no matter what the rumor of the day might be.”
However, Politico reports that the radio broadcaster has been quietly negotiating with other conservative radio personalities and talking to radio talent agents in order to fill the time slots that will be left vacant by Limbaugh and Hannity. An industry insider told Politico that some political personalities being considered include Mike Huckabee, Mark Levin and Michael Savage.
While many news reports say that Cumulus’ decision is not related to the hosts’ controversial political views, not everyone is convinced that is entirely true.
In February 2012, Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown law student, a “slut” and a “prostitute” after she encouraged Washington lawmakers to require health insurance providers to cover birth control.
Limbaugh’s comments about Fluke created a media firestorm, and many groups like Media Matters called for advertisers to stop advertising during Limbaugh’s show. Some big names — such as Sears, Geico, John Deere, Netflix, Capital One and the New York Lottery — pulled their ads from his program.
In May 2013, Cumulus CEO Lew Dickey said that since the Fluke incident, the company has struggled to rake in ad revenue, losing $2.4 million in the first quarter of 2012 and “a couple of million” in the second quarter.
Limbaugh responded that the departing advertisers were replaced and said, “Lew needs someone to blame, (so) he’s pointing fingers instead of fixing his own sales problem.”
An unnamed source close to Limbaugh told Politico that after Dickey publicly blamed the radio host, Limbaugh considered dropping his affiliation with Cumulus.
While Dickey reported that revenue was down 3.5 percent in 2012, he estimated that Limbaugh’s statements took about 1 percent off the company’s income.
According to a May 2013 report in the Huffington Post, a very high-ranking Cumulus official told the news organization anonymously, “Forty-eight of the top 50 network advertisers have ‘excluded Rush and Hannity’ orders. Every major national ad agency has the same dictate.”
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