Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav is bringing a former White House official into the corporate fold. Robert Gibbs—who previously served as former President Barack Obama’s press secretary—joins CNN’s parent company as the new leader of the Communications division. The Hollywood Reporter was the first outlet to break the news on Monday and WBD confirmed the hiring on Tuesday morning.
Gibbs replaces the division’s previous leader, Nathaniel Brown, who stepped down from the role in January after five years.
“At this transformative time in our industry, Robert is the right leader to assume this new, critical global role, as we continue to grow the Warner Bros. Discovery brand and presence around the world,” Zaslav said in a statement provided to TVNewser. “Robert is an insightful and respected leader with experience spanning Fortune 500 companies, the White House, and winning political campaigns. He will be an invaluable part of the team as we create the most captivating stories and content for consumers around the world. I am thrilled to welcome him to WBD.”
In his own statement, Gibbs said he “couldn’t be happier” to start his new role. “I’m particularly excited to work with the global team to fully and clearly capture WBD’s vision and communicate the meaningful growth potential in front of us. I am looking forward to getting started and being a part of this world-class organization.”
Behind the scenes, Zaslav was reportedly looking for a “big name out of the box” to steer WBD’s communications strategy through a challenging period for legacy media companies. Enter Gibbs, who most recently joined the Bully Pulpit International agency as a partner. As THR notes, he also joins WBD with extensive Washington, D.C. connections, which would benefit any potential mergers and acquisitions plans that might be under internal review.
Gibbs will also be closely involved with communicating the details of CNN’s future under Mark Thompson, who is expected to unveil new plans for the network following a lackluster ratings performance in May. Thompson and his executive team have already taking steps to shake up the primetime lineup, naming Anderson Cooper‘s longtime executive producer, Charlie Moore, as CNN’s new vice president of primetime programming.
Speaking with ADWEEK in May, Thompson previewed CNN’s plans to launch branded verticals that would appeal to both audiences and advertisers—a plan that will also be part of Gibbs’s communications portfolio.
“Our brand stands for news, but we want to define news pretty broadly,” Thompson emphasized. “Politics is important, but as far as we’re concerned, the weather is news. Health is news. Sports, entertainment and business are news. What we’re looking at doing is not just making sure that we’re covering all of those areas, but also packaging them and branding them across our linear and digital platforms.”