Nexstar Dropping Scripps-Owned The CW Affiliates in 7 Markets

'Children Ruin Everything' on The CW
The CW viewers in seven markets with Scripps-owned affiliates will soon need to change the channel to find ‘Children Ruin Everything’ and other network shows. (Image credit: Jackie Brown/New Metric Media)

Nexstar Media Group said it does not intend to renew the affiliations of The CW stations owned by the E.W. Scripps Co. in seven markets.

In two of those markets — Norfolk, Virginia, and Lafayette, Louisiana — Nexstar-owned stations will become the new The CW affiliates, effective Sept. 1.

“We have interest from other station groups in the five remaining markets and expect to make announcements about those affiliations soon,” Nexstar said in a statement. “We are prepared for this transition and confident that The CW will continue to reach 100% of US television households without interruption.”  

The other five markets are Detroit; Miami; Tucson, Arizona; Corpus Christi, Texas[ and San Luis Obispo, California.

“This is an opportunity for us to bring Scripps’ excellent local and national programming — entertainment from our networks, news from local stations and Scripps News and, in some markets, local sports rights — to even more audiences across the country,” Scripps said in a statement. “We are still in the process of determining exactly what the new programming will look like in each affected market.”

Jon Lafayette

Jon has been business editor of Broadcasting+Cable since 2010. He focuses on revenue-generating activities, including advertising and distribution, as well as executive intrigue and merger and acquisition activity. Just about any story is fair game, if a dollar sign can make its way into the article. Before B+C, Jon covered the industry for TVWeek, Cable World, Electronic Media, Advertising Age and The New York Post. A native New Yorker, Jon is hiding in plain sight in the suburbs of Chicago.