MSNBC pundit ousted over Kirk talk says network agreed comments were misconstrued

Matthew Dowd tells Katie Couric ex-employer concurred but ‘it didn’t matter’ and they dismissed him anyway

The political analyst fired by MSNBC over his Charlie Kirk commentary says his former employer agreed with him that his remarks were being misconstrued as “insensitive” – but said “it didn’t matter” to the network, and they dismissed him anyway.

“I said: ‘I think you guys are making a huge mistake,’” Matthew Dowd recounted on Katie Couric’s podcast in an episode launched Friday that addressed his purported pre-firing discussions with MSNBC. “I said: ‘You know and I know that’s not anything what I meant. You know it’s been misconstrued,’ and they agreed with that.

“They agreed it had been misconstrued. But they said it didn’t matter. The decision’s been made.”

Dowd’s statements to Couric – who has previously worked for CBS, NBC and ABC – came a little more than a week after he became one of the highest-profile instances of people across the US either being fired from or disciplined at their jobs over commentary about Kirk’s shooting death in Utah on 10 September.