So the huge news in Livingston County this week was that WHMI informed its longtime news director, Jon King, that he was being forced out of his job effective Feb. 25.
While he hasn’t told the full story yet (that’s coming next week), King let it be known that he was forced out of the job because an advertiser pressured WHMI to fire him.
Why? Well, we’ll get into this in a whole lot more detail, but the basic reason is this: Jon King is a very liberal newsman in a very conservative county. The yet-to-be-named advertiser didn’t like that fact, so they put the screws on WHMI to show him the door.
Jon King’s friends and supporters are outraged about that. His detractors are elated. And so, we now have the biggest Livingston County media scandal we’ve had in a long, long time.
And with King set to tell his side of the story on Michigan Radio’s “Stateside” program on Tuesday, it’s about to get even juicier.
There’s more, too.
Along with new news director job, King does double duty at the Howell radio station as the co-host of the morning show Mike & Jon in the morning. And he announced on Friday’s show that instead of leaving on Feb. 25, he would be leaving immediately.
Not only that, but his morning partner, Mike Marino, announced that he’d be leaving WHMI, too. Also effective immediately. Unlike King, Marino wasn’t fired from his job, but he decided that he didn’t want to go on with a new partner, so he walked out the door alongside his longtime co-host.
So let’s recap here:
Jon King, who has been WHMI’s news director for about 20 years, was told last week that he was being fired on Feb. 25 because an advertiser didn’t like his liberal ways.
Jon King then said, “Screw that, I’m leaving now.”
Mike Marino, his morning show partner, then said, “Screw that, too, I’m leaving with you.”
So on Monday morning, we’re going to have God knows what on 93.5FM in the morning, with God knows who deciding which stories they’re going to cover on the news. All while we wait for Jon to tell his side of the story on Tuesday.
And if you don’t think that Livingston County is hanging on every bit of this soap opera, then you don’t know Livingston County very well. This is a fascinating one from every single angle.
Now, before we get into the full analysis of this story, let me just say without bragging that I happen to know a thing or two about being a much-loved and much-hated Livingston County media icon who suddenly lost his job. (Well, maybe I’m exaggerating about the much-loved part, but the much-hated thing was very true.)
Back in 2009, I was unceremoniously ousted from my job as one of the editors of the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus. The circumstances of my departure from the media scene were quite different from Jon King’s, though. I wasn’t fired because an advertiser didn’t like me; I was canned because the owner of the newspaper, the evil Gannett Co., eliminated my position. The paper’s managing editor, Maria Stuart, was laid off on the same day.
Just like with Jon King, though, I had some fans who were very upset that the newspaper had let me go, and some enemies who were very happy that I was gone. Most of the happy people were Livingston County Democrats who were thrilled they wouldn’t have to read my conservative crap in the paper anymore.
So in one sense, I can relate to what Jon’s going through. In another sense, though, I can’t relate at all. I wasn’t fired because an advertiser didn’t like my politics. He apparently was.
I should also say that I have some personal history with Jon. This is a small county, after all. When I was at the newspaper, we were competitors, and when I left, we had a few encounters. He had me on the morning show a few times through the years, most recently last year when they invited me on to talk about my book, “Murder of an Elvis Girl.” I appreciated that.
Before we get into the analysis, though, it’s important to look at Livingston County and the media landscape here, because that’s very important to the story.
Livingston County is unique in Michigan because we’re one of the only places in this state with a true “county” identity. We aren’t just from Brighton or Howell or Pinckney or Hartland or Fowlerville. We’re from Livingston County. We identify with our county just as much as we identify with our hometown.
You always hear a person from Brighton or Howell say, “I’m from Livingston County.” You never hear someone from Holt or Mason say, “I’m from Ingham County.”
And the county media outlets have always helped foster that county spirit. Aside from the Fowlerville News and Views, all of our big three media outlets are “county” outlets with a county identity – the Livingston Post, the Livingston Daily Press and Argus and WHMI.
As our only local radio station, WHMI has always been a major cog in this machine. The radio station was founded in 1957 and was owned for many years by the Bignell family. They sold it in 1987 to Greg and Marcia Jablonski, a well-known Pinckney family, and in 2015, the Jablonskis sold it to Krol Communications, a company that’s based in Owosso. For the first time ever, WHMI was owned by someone from outside the county.
Jon King came along about 20 years ago and became the station’s news director, and about that same time, he joined the morning show with Mike Marino.
Now we get to the political part. As the co-host of the morning show, from what I could tell, King didn’t talk politics much. Mike & Jon in the Morning was always a highly local, upbeat, light, fun, happy show. Lots of local guests talking about local things. I’m more of a sports talk radio guy, but I listened to WHMI in the morning quite a bit and I always enjoyed their show. For all of us in Livingston County, listening to Mike and Jon in the morning was familiar and comfortable. It fit like an old shoe.
But that part of his job didn’t get him into trouble, from what we’ve heard. It was the other part of his job, as WHMI’s news director. That’s where the trouble happened.
See, here’s the deal. Livingston County is a conservative, Republican county. It is. That’s not my opinion; it’s a fact. To illustrate the point, this is how we voted for president in 2020 (the red areas went for Trump, the blue areas went for Biden):
Got it? We aren’t 100 percent Republican, but we’re about 65 percent Republican. We’re mostly conservative and Republican here, and I’m assuming that means WHMI’s potential audience is mostly conservative and Republican.
Now, here’s the difference between a radio station like WHMI and a publication like the Livingston Post.
The way a publication works – whether it’s an online publication like the Livingston Post or a newspaper like the Livingston Daily Press & Argus – is that there’s room for a lot of diverse voices and viewpoints.
Take the LivPo, for example. The two main people who write opinion pieces for the Post are Maria Stuart and me. Maria’s the owner and founder of the Post. I’m an unpaid blogger who just writes anytime something pops into my head.
Maria leans left. I lean right. Maria has also opened up the Post to almost anyone who wants to write an opinion piece, and as a result, there are op-eds and letters to the editor that cover the entire political spectrum.
So the Livingston Post is a true melting pot of Livingston County voices, ideas and opinions. There’s room enough here for everyone.
That’s not the way it is at WHMI. They don’t have multiple voices or viewpoints. They don’t let everyone and their brother have a say.
There’s only room for one news director who gets to call the shots. Just one. And because WHMI is the only news outlet in the county that regularly reports hard news (the Daily Press & Argus is a joke), that makes the WHMI news director a very powerful person in our community.
That person dictates what gets covered and what doesn’t. Which questions are asked and which ones aren’t. Which way the stories are going to lean.
For the past 20 years or so, that person has been Jon King, and as a result of his position and how he chose to use it, he’s been a very powerful person in Livingston County. His critics and admirers alike would probably agree on that.
And here’s the thing: Jon King is personally a liberal. Very liberal. If you look at his social media, he makes no effort to hide that fact, which is absolutely fine and wonderful.
To which he would probably say, “So what?”
The question for some people is, though: Did his personal politics ever impact his job as the news director at WHMI?
I’m guessing that Jon and his supporters would say absolutely not. They would say the fact that he’s personally a liberal never came into play at WHMI. They would challenge you to find a single story he ever did that was biased, inaccurate or false.
There are other people, though – including a lot of Livingston County Republicans and the advertiser who got him fired – who would contend that Jon King’s liberal politics did indeed come into play a lot at WHMI. They would point to the way he covered such stories as President Biden’s visit to Howell, the anti-mask protests, Drag Queen Bingo and a host of other politically charged stories. I’m not saying that I feel that way, because I don’t think I heard him report on any of those stories. What I’m saying is that other people feel that way.
So the word on the street is that they went to WHMI to complain and then they finally got a big advertiser to make the demand. “Jon King has crossed the line between politics and news, and we don’t want a liberal newsman in our conservative county.”
Again, this is just one person’s analysis.
I will say this, though. When you look at the reaction on social media to Jon King’s ouster, the outrage has been almost entirely from the left. Heck, the Livingston County Democrats themselves even took to Facebook to talk about how unfair it was:
Why would the Democrats be so upset about this that they’d use their official party Facebook page to talk about it? Could it be that they viewed Jon King as one of their own, and they were upset that he was no longer in power?
Of course it is. I think it’s always been a source of comfort to the county’s Democrats that the county’s most powerful journalist was a liberal. Jon King had the position and the platform to hold all of the county’s powerful Republicans accountable.
He’s never run for office in his life, but King was far and away the most powerful Democrat in Livingston County. The local liberals loved that fact, which is why they’re so despondent that he’s gone. They’re threatening advertiser boycotts and saying they’ll never listen to WHMI again. We’ll see how that all plays out.
King is going to be on “Stateside” on Tuesday, and he’ll have the full chance to tell his side of the story. It’ll be fascinating to see if he names names. If he does, I’m guessing those names will then tell their side of things. This story is far from over.
So that’s a really, really long analysis of this Livingston County soap opera. And now, here are some of my opinions on it all.
I think it’s a terrible thing that the “Mike & Jon in the Morning” show is gone. It’ll be interesting to see what show replaces it, but that was a spectacularly good local radio show. The best thing about it was the way they promoted local events. If the local theater group was doing a play, they’d have the directors and actors on the air to talk about it.
As a community, we’re going to miss that terribly. Losing that show is a huge loss for Livingston County.
Regarding the decision to fire him for his politics, as unsettling as that might be, that’s the radio station’s right. They own the microphones and the broadcasting license, so they get to decide who uses them. A lot of the people who are saying this is a horrible case of censorship are the same people who say that every cable system in the country should drop Fox News.
But hey, WHMI, you’re now about to reap what you sowed. You just made a political decision, and now we’ll see if that was a good decision or a bad one. If nothing else, you’ve fired up the masses on both sides.
It will also be interesting to see what happens now with WHMI’s news department. Say what you want about his politics, but Jon King did one hell of a thorough job covering Livingston County – and with the newspaper dead and dying, they were pretty much the only ones doing the day-to-day hard news.
The Livingston Post doesn’t cover much hard news. It’s the only local source of opinion and analysis, and the entertainment and features stories are great. But the Post doesn’t cover city council or school board meetings. WHMI does. With Jon King gone, what will happen to WHMI’s news coverage?
Related to that, I thought that this was downright awful of both WHMI and the Livingston Daily Press & Argus: Neither one of those outlets has reported on this story. The forced ouster of Jon King is far and away the biggest story in Livingston County this week, and the only local outlet reporting on it is the Livingston Post.
Stay tuned. This story is just getting started, and evidently, you can’t count on WHMI or the Daily Press & Argus to tell you what’s going on.
