CNN’s Acosta moving away from White House

CNN is shifting chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta to a new beat, the network announced Monday. 

Acosta will serve as CNN’s chief domestic correspondent and will have anchor coverage on the weekends, the network said.  

News of Acosta’s new role came along with several other moves the network announced, including the expansion of anchor Jake Tapper’s weekday program to two hours. Tapper will “serve as the network’s lead anchor for all major Washington events,” CNN said. 

Acosta, who has served as CNN’s chief White House correspondent since 2018, has been with the network since 2007. 

His sometimes combative exchanges with President Trump and several White House press secretaries made Acosta a target for the president and his allies, who regularly attacked journalists as “the enemy of the people.” 

Following a testy exchange between Acosta and Trump in late 2018, during which the president called Acosta “a rude, terrible person,” the White House revoked the reporter’s press credentials without giving a reason for doing so. 

The White House eventually restored Acosta’s press pass after CNN threatened to sue over the dispute.  

In 2019, Acosta published a book titled “The Enemy of the People,” an account he says details “the dangers he faces reporting on the current White House while fighting on the front lines in President Trump’s war on truth.” 

“If a politician’s supporters are so blinded by their own passions that they can walk up to a journalist at a political event and scream that she’s a traitor,” Acosta in a tweet Sunday quoted his book in reference to the rioting that took place on Capitol Hill last week. “Or anonymously threaten a reporter’s life on social media, then we, as a society, are surrendering something far greater than politics. We are surrendering our decency, and perhaps our humanity. It is perfectly fair to ask how does this end without suffering.”

Acosta confirmed his new position in a tweet on Monday. 

“On to the next adventure! After eight years at WH, I’m moving into a new role as anchor on weekends and chief domestic correspondent for @CNN, a new challenge I’m very excited about,” he said. “Will miss my WH colleagues. But I know they’ll be great covering the Biden admin. See you soon!”

–Updated at 11:10 a.m.