Gray TV Launching New Greta Van Susteren Talk Show

Veteran cable news host Greta Van Susteren is returning to television with a new Sunday public affairs program that will aim to be a must-stop for 2020 presidential candidates and their ad dollars.

The L-A Times reports station ownership group Gray Television announced the new entry Monday at the National Assn. of Broadcasters’ annual gathering in Las Vegas. Van Susteren’s program “Full Court Press” will air Sundays starting in September in the 93 markets where the Atlanta-based Gray owns television stations and on Weigel Broadcasting stations in Chicago and Milwaukee.

Greta Van Susteren

Gray is also syndicating the program nationally, offering it to other stations in markets where it does not own an outlet.

“Full Court Press” will cover national politics while using the resources of Gray’s TV stations’ news operations to provide local context to the issues covered. The program will also use Gray’s national investigative reporting team, which provides its segments to stations and the streaming video channel InvestigateTV.

“It’s perfect for the presidential campaign,” Sandy Breland, senior vice president for local media for Gray, told The Times. “But it will be through the local lens of our stations. We find that more than ever our viewers want to know how decisions in Washington will have an impact in their community.”

Van Susteren, 64, was a staple of cable news for 23 years after starting out as a legal expert for CNN’s coverage of O.J. Simpson’s murder trial. She had her own show on CNN, spent 14 years as a prime-time host on Fox News — replaced by Tucker Carlson in November 2016 — and most recently had a six-month stint at MSNBC, which ended in June 2017.

Van Susteren joined Gray in February as a national political analyst. She is also a contributor for the government radio service Voice of America.

Van Susteren’s straight-ahead nonpartisan style made her a tougher fit for cable news, where ratings have soared for opinionated hosts such as Carlson and MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow in the highly polarizing era of the Trump White House. The broadcast TV stations where “Full Court Press” will air still appeal to viewers looking for political talk on Sunday mornings, thanks to such long-running programs as NBC’s “Meet the Press” and CBS’s “Face the Nation.”