9News started its run as the top-rated TV station in the Denver television market back in the late-1970s, and for decades each newscast ended with video of regular people holding up their index fingers to remind viewers (and competitors) who was No. 1.
The tradition fizzled out in the early 2000s, but current viewers might have noticed a new ending to the 9News newscast in the past few days, one that spells out a monumental change to the station and the Denver television market. A new copyright statement now flashes across the screen at the end of 9News broadcasts, marking the station’s first ownership change in 47 years, and the first time it will share a copyright with the station that has been its top competitor.
Nexstar Media Group, owner of KDVR Fox31, and Tegna, the parent of 9News, last week announced their $6.2 billion megamerger had closed.
The news stoked fears that dozens of mostly 9News employees could be let go, accountability journalism could suffer and popular anchor Kyle Clark could find himself off the air.
The announcement came after several months of “will they or won’t they” drama, which included President Donald Trump weighing in on the deal and the Federal Communications Commission waiving its ownership rule that caps the number of TV stations one company can own in a single market.
The waiver gives Nexstar permission to own three stations in Denver, including 9News and Fox31, without having to sell one of the two. The deal also allows Nexstar to keep KWGN CW2. In exchange, Nexstar agreed to divest KTVD My20 within two years.
Nexstar also owns KXRM/KXTU Fox21 in Colorado Springs and KREX 5/Fox 4 in Grand Junction.
Nationally, the deal gives Nexstar 260 stations in 44 states that will reach 80% of U.S. television households.
Attorneys general in eight states, including Colorado, last week filed an antitrust lawsuit to block the merger claiming it would cause “irreparable harm to local news and consumers who rely on their reporting as a critical source of information.”
The lawsuit cites concerns about reporting and access to news, as well as expected price increases for cable and satellite subscribers in the 35 television markets, like Denver, that will now have combined stations. DirectTV also sued to block the deal. The nation’s largest pay-TV distributor claims Nexstar will use its size to hike its costs they will in turn pass on to the consumer.
In those markets, “formerly independent newsrooms that generated their own stories, employed separate slates of staff and talent, and made separate editorial decisions, now rely on a single talent team, share a single website, and offer essentially the same local news,” the AGs said in the antitrust lawsuit filed March 18 in U.S. District Court in Sacramento.
The AGs filed their lawsuit just hours before the Department of Justice and FCC announced on March 19 they had approved the deal. On Friday, California Attorney General Rob Bonta, on behalf of the group, filed for a temporary restraining order to prevent the merger from going forward.
In a news release, Bonta said: “This merger is illegal, plain and simple, running contrary to federal antitrust laws that protect consumers. I will not let these corporate behemoths merge without a fight.”
Journalists at both stations are anxious to learn what will happen next. None would speak on the record.
Perry Sook, Nexstar’s founder and CEO, on Tuesday sent an email addressed to “The Nexstar Nation” announcing a town hall Thursday where he will “talk about the roadmap ahead, our top priorities for the remainder of 2026, and our expectations through the year-end and beyond.”
The town hall will be the first official all-hands meeting for the staff of the combined companies.
“There’s never been anything like this before,” said Roger Ogden, who spent most of his career in newsroom and TV management starting at 9News in the 1960s. Ogden served as president and general manager at KCNC CBS4 and later KUSA 9News, as well as serving as president of NBC Europe and CEO of Gannett Broadcasting.
Ogden says Denver will feel the merger more than most of Nexstar’s markets because of the size of the newsrooms and their editorial impact.
“I don’t think there’ll be two news operations,” he said. “It’ll be combined, and Channel 31 and their news director will be calling all the shots.”
The companies have said combining the two operations would allow them to “expand local news coverage, strengthen digital offerings, and increase advertising opportunities.”
But longtime Denver TV insiders like Ogden say this merger comes with a much higher cost to independent reporting in Colorado. Ogden predicts deep cuts will be needed to make the finances of this merger work. He expects to see 80 to 90 journalists laid off in Denver.
To complete the transaction, Nexstar took on $5.1 billion in new debt, adding to fears there will be cuts in the company’s 31 overlapping markets. The final deal has been met with mixed reaction on Wall Street.
“The pressures on Nexstar to make it economically viable are going to be enormous,” Ogden said.
What a combined station might look like
Long before last week’s announcement, KUSA 9News management sent an email to its staff to warn that Nexstar representatives would soon be seen in the building at 500 Speer Blvd. One insider described it as an opportunity “to measure the curtains.”
Ogden said moving both stations into one building is one way the expanded company could reduce costs. His guess is the stations will move into the Fox31 building at 101 Speer Blvd., which is a little larger.
Tom Green, a former 9News and CW2 anchor, knows what it is like to be in the shoes of journalists at 9 and 31 who are waiting to hear what Nexstar has planned.
When CW2’s parent company, Tribune, bought KDVR Fox31 in 2013, the two newsrooms combined into the Fox building on Speer and Lincoln.
Green remembers anchoring his CW morning show broadcast from a makeshift set in the newsroom, while the Fox31 morning show broadcast from the larger studio down the hall.
“Because we were doing the same show in the morning, the Channel 31 morning show and our morning show,” he said, “that made it pretty awkward trying to sort out who’s going to do what, when and where.”
It was that proximity, he added, that made it impossible for each station to maintain editorial independence.
“There’s just going to be some decisions that have to be made as a newsroom, as a news team,” he said.
And what about Kyle Clark?
Google “is Kyle Clark leaving 9News” and you will find link after link of speculation about what might lie ahead for the popular anchor.
Clark joined 9News as a reporter in 2007. His innovative “Next with Kyle Clark” is the most highly ranked show in the Denver market, but the top billing doesn’t fully sum up his influence.
Launched in 2016 with no regular sports segments and only a minute of weather, “Next” has leaned hard into accountability reporting and unapologetic commentary that is unusual in today’s TV news landscape.
Clark has cultivated a huge and loyal following of viewers who routinely make small-dollar donations to the program’s microgiving that benefits nonprofits and charitable causes. But he’s also been the target of conservative critics who say he’s too liberal.
The criticism has added to speculation the show and Clark will not fit into Nexstar’s future, especially after the merger received public support from Trump, who posted on his Truth Social network about the deal:
The fact that the show that bears his name is a ratings juggernaut, his sometimes-sarcastic tone when holding politicians and others to account, no matter their political affiliation, along with Clark’s ability to connect with viewers through social media, makes his future of particular interest to Ogden.
“It’s financially by far the most successful show that Channel 9 has now,” Ogden said. Which means Nexstar must decide, he said, “does the money matter most or does the content?”
Clark has given his most honest answers to what happens next for him during his daily viewer feedback segment when he answers comments that come in during the show. “Next” has covered the merger extensively and reported the FCC and DOJ decision within minutes of its announcement March 19.
Clark choked up reading a viewer comment that started with, “I am praying big time for all of you guys at 9News,” from a viewer named Emily. He went on to read the note from Emily, who said 9News has been “a part of my life all of my life.” Hers was a sentiment shared by many others in the community in comments to a post of the segment online.
Clark’s response to Emily live on television was as honest an answer as anyone could have given. “I’m not in a position right now to talk about what the future is going to hold, but I will tell you what I have told the ‘Next’ team, we’re going to try to do meaningful work for as long as we can do it because we know that it matters to the community,” he said. “And on a personal note, Colorado is my home, it’s my family’s home and I hope to find a way to contribute for many years to come.”
The Sun reached out to Clark, as well as 9News, Tegna and Nexstar to comment for this story. None responded to the requests.
Corey Hutchins, who runs the Journalism Institute at Colorado College, advises the Colorado Media Project, and writes the weekly Inside the News in Colorado newsletter about the state’s media scene, said there may be opportunity this moment of consolidation.
“I think the fallout from all this chaos at the TV stations in Denver could offer an opportunity for any person, group or organization that might be thinking about how to revolutionize broadcast news in the streaming and social media era to consider Colorado as a pilot,” he said, citing innovation that has resulted in Colorado as traditional print media has contracted.
The biggest losers
It’s not just the journalists who lose their jobs who will suffer, said Lynn Valencia, who was vice president of community relations at 9News for nine years.
“It’s definitely going to hurt the community,” she said.
9News has already shed community outreach events like the in-person 9Cares Colorado Shares food drives, the 9HealthFair, Buddy Check9 and the Shred-a-thon.
“Maybe the day of the food drive is over,” Valencia said, adding that she fears the merged stations will have even fewer incentives to invest in large community events. “Stations aren’t doing anything to try to connect to the real local community, and I think that’s their strength.”
