CBS Canceling ‘Late Show With Stephen Colbert’

[Ralph Wiggum]

CBS said Thursday that it was canceling “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” and retiring a late-night franchise that has existed for more than three decades.

Mr. Colbert’s run — and “The Late Show” itself — will end in May.

“This is purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night,” said George Cheeks, the president of CBS and co-chief executive of Paramount, CBS’s parent company. “It is not related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount. Our admiration, affection and respect for the talents of Stephen Colbert and his incredible team made this agonizing decision even more difficult.”

NY Slimes link via paywall.

Edit: Fox News link

https://www.foxnews.com/media/cbs-cancels-the-late-show-stephen-colbert-end-program-may-2026

And Gutfeld slays another loser...

[SVPete]

Translating the SeeBS blah-blah into accurate English, Colbert's audience isn't large enough to garner sufficient ad revenue, so they're cancelling him (pun intended).

[Ptarmigan]

Why can it in May 2026 if it is a financial decision?

[Ralph Wiggum]

Why can it in May 2026 if it is a financial decision?

They probably have to pay off his contract whether the show is on the air or not. And his staff of hundreds are likely unionized who can't be axed immediately. Gutfeld has mentioned this before both on TV and on his website. His show has a staff of about 15 people, most of whom work in other capacities on the network. The other late night shows typically have 15 writers and probably 15 executive producers, not to mention all the other supporting folks.

Coal-bert and Kimmel simply lost the ability to be funny when President Trump emerged on the political scene. That is their main mission: to be entertaining.

[SVPete]

Apparently, Colbert lambasted SeeBS owner Paramount for settling Trump's lawsuit. Paramount may have been unamused with his runt-rant as well as less than happy with his ratings and ad revenue.

[SVPete]

Democrats Are Flipping Out Over Colbert’s Cancellation

https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2025/07/18/democrats-are-flipping-out-over-colberts-cancellation-n4941872

On Thursday evening, we learned that Stephen Colbert’s “The Late Show” will be axed in May 2026. Those of us on the right weren’t particularly shocked. Despite Colbert's reputation as the king of late night, Greg Gutfeld dethroned him in the fall of 2022, and it seemed inevitable that as Colbert’s ratings fell, so would ad revenue.

Naturally, the usual suspects on the left are in full meltdown mode. The narrative from their side is simple: Any setback for one of their favorite propagandists must be a covert political hit job orchestrated by Trump and his cronies.
...
Late-night TV has been hemorrhaging money for years as viewers jump ship for streaming services. In 2018, these shows raked in $439 million in ad revenue. Last year, that figure crashed to $220 million — a collapse so catastrophic that no amount of Trump jokes could paper it over. But try telling that to the likes of Adam Schiff and Elizabeth Warren, who see sinister motives everywhere except in themselves.
...
Democratic Sens. Schiff and Warren practically tripped over themselves, racing to social media and demanding an investigation, as though Colbert’s show was a sacred institution under assault.

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The left’s hysteria is transparent. Paramount’s merger with Skydance still needs sign-off from the Trump administration and the FCC. Throw in a $16 million settlement to Trump over a “60 Minutes” interview, and Democrats are convinced there’s a grand scheme to silence their guy, all conveniently ignoring that Paramount might simply want to stop losing money.