James Rosen leaving Fox News

Fox News chief Washington correspondent James Rosen is leaving the network, a spokesperson confirmed to The Hill on Friday.

“James Rosen is exiting the company at the end of the year,” a Fox News spokesperson said in an email.

No reason was provided for Rosen’s departure. He has been with Fox News since 1999. The network launched in 1996.

{mosads}

Rosen generated headlines in 2013 after it was revealed the Obama Justice Department spied on him extensively three years earlier as part of a probe into documents leaked to the media.

Rosen, who the Justice Department labeled a “criminal co-conspirator and a flight risk,” had his movements tracked when entering and exiting the State Department and his phone records and personal emails searched.

“We are outraged to learn today that James Rosen was named a criminal co-conspirator for simply doing his job as a reporter,” then-Fox News executive Michael Clemente said in 2013. “In fact, it is downright chilling. We will unequivocally defend his right to operate as a member of what up until now has always been a free press.”

In 2014, then-Attorney General Eric Holder said he could have been “a little more careful” during the Rosen investigation.

“I think that I could’ve been a little more careful looking at the language that was contained in the filing that we made with the court. He was labeled as a co-conspirator … I think that could have been differently, done better,” Holder said.

Rosen responded by stating Holder’s remarks “scarcely address the relevant facts of his conduct.”

“Throughout this ordeal for my family and me, I have tried to keep my head down and continue covering – and breaking – the news. I consider myself blessed to have an employer in Fox News, and a boss in Roger Ailes, who have stood by me and enabled me to remain focused on what matters most to me in professional terms: first-rate journalism,” wrote Rosen.

Rosen also said the incident raised “serious concerns about the state of press freedoms under the present administration.”

Rosen is the author of two books, including 2016’s “A Torch Kept Lit: Great Lives of the Twentieth Century,” a compilation of writings of conservative William F. Buckley.

Fox News has seen several on-air veterans of the network depart or be ousted in 2017, including top-rated host Bill O’Reilly amid sexual harassment allegations in April, former prime-time star Megyn Kelly, who jumped to NBC News in January, and former “The Five” host Eric Bolling, who also was let go following allegations of sexual harassment.