The Hill’s popular web talk show Rising, which recently parted ways with controversial podcaster Kim Iversen, is losing two more of its hosts—this time, to one of its biggest competitors which is currently hosted by Rising’s former star duo.
The Intercept reporter Ryan Grim and The Federalist editor Emily Jashinsky, who have recently served as regular Friday hosts of Rising, are bailing for Breaking Points, the political podcast created by progressive commentator Krystal Ball and conservative pundit Saagar Enjeti after they, too, departed Rising last year.
Grim and Jashinsky are set to start with Breaking Points in mid-September, Grim and Enjeti confirmed to The Daily Beast. The pair are set to announce they are leaving on this Friday’s Rising, and will officially depart as the show’s regular Friday hosts after two more broadcasts.
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Grim and Jashinsky could still be welcome back to Rising as guest hosts if needed in the future, The Daily Beast has learned—save for Fridays, which will be reserved exclusively for Breaking Points. A representative for Nexstar, The Hill’s parent company, did not respond to a request for comment.
Ball and Enjeti had previously helmed Rising (then known as Rising with Krystal & Saagar) from 2019 until their departure in May 2021. Ball, a former MSNBC host and Democratic political candidate, was one of the show’s original presenters when it launched in June 2018, co-hosting alongside right-wing radio talker Buck Sexton. Enjeti, a former Daily Caller correspondent and Tucker Carlson protégé, took over for Sexton the following year.
After building up Rising’s viewership with punditry that focused on the left- and right-wing versions of populism, scoring a book deal in the process, Enjeti and Ball jumped ship to launch their own independent talk show. While Breaking Points quickly soared up the podcast charts, the progressive Grim and conservative Jashinsky were tapped to help fill the vacancy left by the ex-Rising pair.
Since then, however, The Hill’s flagship show has gone through more than a few hiccups.
The program at one point hired provocateur Kim Iversen as a rotating host to fill the “populist left” chair. The self-described “no b.s. broadcaster” soon sparked uproar among Hill staffers over some of the fringe views she pushed on the show, with one senior employee calling her a “conspiracy theorist.” (At one point, for instance, Grim confronted her on air for seemingly defending the brutal treatment of the Uyghurs by the Chinese government.)
The tension eventually came to a head when Rising scored an interview with chief White House medical adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci last month, which was conducted by Reason writer Robby Soave and Newsweek deputy opinion editor Batya Ungar-Sargon. Iversen, a vocal vaccine skeptic who has been loudly critical of COVID-19 mitigation policies, was publicly miffed that she was not included in the interview and abruptly exited the show days later.
Publicly addressing her departure in a social media video, Iversen slammed the show’s producers for not including her in the Fauci conversation, branding it a “giant mistake.” She warned that viewers would question her absence because they “flocked to Rising for this content” and would “no longer trust the show” if she wasn’t there to grill Fauci.
Nexstar spokesman Gary Weitman, meanwhile, claimed to The Daily Beast at the time that Iversen was “not an employee of The Hill” and that “she’s not resigning from anything.” Additionally, he said the show’s producers will “decide who will conduct interviews” and had “decided that having other reporters interview Dr. Fauci would deliver more useful information to viewers.”
With Grim and Jashinsky soon gone, Rising will continue to rely largely on Soave and leftist commentator Briahna Joy Gray, a former Intercept editor and one-time spokesperson for Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign. In recent months, Gray and Soave have been the show’s regular presenters throughout the week.
