Rachel Maddow's Salary Was Reportedly Cut by $5 Million Thanks to Comcast

MSNBC is going through some tough times, and it appears that even the network's biggest talents aren't immune. Rachel Maddow, one of the network's biggest names, even took a paycut, trimming her salary by $5 million.

Following the news that Rachel's salary had been trimmed by $5 million, many wanted to know what the starting figure was. After all, most of us don't make $5 million a year, so the idea of taking that in a paycut is hard to fathom. Here's what we know about Rachel's salary at MSNBC.

According to reporting in The Ankler, Rachel was making $30 million a year from MSNBC to host the show on Monday nights, just one night a week. She has now renegotiated her salary with the network so that she will make $25 million a year for the next five years. “This is a difficult time and they needed to keep her,” one executive explained. “No one else can do what she does. You can’t build a brand like it overnight.”

Another source with knowledge disputed the claim that Rachel had taken such a significant pay cut in speaking with The New York Post, but did not clarify how much she might have lost.

Rachel's significant salary in combination with her light work load speaks to how valuable her brand is to the network, even as they enter a turbulent period.

The apparent reasons for Rachel's pay cut is a broader climate of panic inside 30 Rock that followed the news that Comcast is planning to spin off all of its cable channels by the end of 2025. That will mean that MSNBC will be split off from NBC, which might mean that the network has to change its name, logo, and branding, and could also result in fairly significant layoffs.

Rachel's new deal will keep her on her current schedule of hosting the cable show on Monday nights and also gives her the ability to produce podcasts and documentaries with the network. The network is reportedly also planning to use her as a "secret weapon," which means that she might be brought in at other somewhat random times whenever breaking news dictates it.

Ratings for the network are currently falling quite drastically in the wake of Donald Trump's reelection to the presidency.

“We were so Harris propaganda that when she lost, viewers were shocked,” one on-air commentator explained to The Ankler, suggesting that the network had misled their viewers about the possibility of a Trump victory.

“It turned into one giant circle j–k and echo chamber. If MSNBC wants to be of service to its viewers, they can’t keep them in fantasy land," the commentator added.

For now, though, it seems like hosts will be scrambling to figure out exactly what the shift at Comcast means for them. As one of the network's biggest stars, Rachel is safer than most.