"An honor to be welcomed into your homes" - Lester Holt delivers final segment as lead anchor on NBC Nightly News as he exits after a decade

Prominent news anchor, Lester Holt bids adieu to the weekly edition of NBC Nightly News, which he has been hosting for a decade. After ten long years, the renowned senior journalist Holt quits one of the most popular news programs on NBC while calling it the "honor of his lifetime," as he hosted the program for the last time on May 30, 2025. Lester Holt, who has had a reputation of being one of the most trusted news anchors in the US, according to a 2018 poll, will be succeeded by Tom Llamas.

45-year-old Tom Llamas, who previously worked as the weekend anchor for ABC News, joined NBC as a general-assignment reporter and anchor, then eventually became a host for NBC Top Story. Llamas is set to take over Nightly News on June 2, 2025.

As per the New York Post, Lester Holt kick-started his professional career in 1981 at CBS and then joined NBC in 2003. It has been almost 22 years since he has been hosting programs and reporting news on the NBC network.

66-year-old Lester Holt broke the news of his exit from NBC Nightly News on February 24, 2025. Among the several new programs he hosted at NBC, he also hosted Dateline. While hosting Nightly News for the last time on May 30, 2025, Lester Holt said:

"After 10 years at Nightly News, it's my final broadcast — from Paris to Tokyo, Uvalde to Ukraine, the greatest generation to the wild blue yonder, the news we've covered, the people we've met and the stories we've told. Your stories. My gratitude to all of you on this special night."

Lester took the opportunity to end the program with a heartfelt speech, saying:

"As anchor, it has been an honor to lead this program and an honor to be welcomed into your homes. I'm so grateful for your trust."

He continued and said:

"Around here, facts matter, words matter, journalism matters and you matter. Over the last decade, we have shared some dark and harrowing days and nights from our country — the pandemic, mass shootings, natural disasters — each testing our resilience and our compassion. That's why I often like to leave you with something to smile about, moments that reassure and connect us."

Holt Lester further added:

"I'll miss our evenings together, and I will miss the team that puts it all together, my dear friends and my colleagues. But for now, I just want to say thank you to my incredibly supportive and patient family and all of you. Please continue to take care of yourself and each other, and I'll do the same."

Lester Holt reveals why he quit Nightly News

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With a successful news career, Lester Holt, on the Today Show on May 30, revealed that the primary reason for his exit from Nightly News was that he was offered an even bigger and more significant role. Lester Holt said:

"The time just seemed to be right. You know, you hit a certain age and you start kind of thinking, 'What's the back part of my career going to look like?' I never wanted to be one of those people that was totally associated with just one thing."

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