'Morning Joe' hosts’ absences spark 'workplace meltdown': report

Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, the married hosts of MS NOW's "Morning Joe" have been conspicuously absent lately and are sending the show's producers into a panic, reports RadarOnline.

"Insiders now claim the couple's increasingly high number of absences has sparked a 'workplace meltdown' as the network scrambles to cover for them," Radar reports.

Before the network rebranded from MSNBC, the hosts "reportedly appeared together in just 70 of 124 episodes," Radar notes.

"Scarborough couldn't be found for 29 episodes, and Brzezinski was absent from 41, which worked out to about one missed show every three days. In July alone, Brzezinski missed two straight weeks of episodes," they add.

The couple typically hosts the program "from a decked-out studio at their Jupiter, Florida, home," Radar explains.

"Given their extremely short work commute, many speculated whether the absences were due to one partner sleeping in while the other goes live on-air at 6 a.m.," they say.

The pair's schedules, whatever they are, have ruffled feathers of the show's staffers, according to Radar, leading to "chaos" behind the scenes.

"There’s no leadership," a senior producer tells entertainment journalist Rob Shuter, who writes on Substack. "Every day is a scramble. Who’s hosting? What’s the tone? Who’s running the ship? No one knows."

An anonymous insider tells Radar that the show's producers are panicking as they head into a big election year.

"They have special deals, endless vacation time – but this summer went too far. We're headed into an election year, and we're stuck with empty chairs," the source says.

Days before the network became MS NOW, however, the couple started to reappear more regularly, they report, clocking "their longest consecutive streak of appearances since Memorial Day at three weeks and counting."