{"id":264960,"date":"2026-06-12T21:52:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T21:52:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/264960\/"},"modified":"2026-06-12T21:52:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T21:52:11","slug":"abc-new-york-anchor-bill-ritter-to-retire-due-to-health-issue-sources","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/264960\/","title":{"rendered":"ABC New York anchor Bill Ritter to retire due to health issue: sources"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Beloved WABC anchor Bill Ritter is set to announce his retirement during Friday evening\u2019s broadcast because of Alzheimer\u2019s disease, The Post has learned.<\/p>\n<p>The 76-year-old newsman \u2013 who has been at WABC since June 1998 \u2013 stepped away from the 11 p.m. broadcast in March 2025 following 25 years on the nightly news desk.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:0.66601563;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39661593\" width=\"393\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2026-disney-upfront-jacob-javits-130739461.jpg\" alt=\"Bill Ritter attending the 2026 Disney Upfront.\" class=\"wp-image-39661593\"  \/>Beloved WABC anchor Bill Ritter is set to announce his retirement during Friday evening\u2019s broadcast because of Alzheimer\u2019s disease. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Sources said it\u2019s unclear whether Ritter, who has three children, will announce his Alzheimer\u2019s diagnosis on air.<\/p>\n<p>He\u2019s described by journalists who have worked with him as a \u201creal newsman\u201d who is \u201cwell- respected\u201d and \u201cactively involved in making the newscast better.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s everything you want in a New York City anchor. He sets a standard for all of us,\u201d a source said.<\/p>\n<p>Ritter took over the 11 p.m. news for Bill Beutel in 1999. He currently anchors the 6 p.m. broadcast with Liz Cho.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Beloved WABC anchor Bill Ritter is set to announce his retirement during Friday evening\u2019s broadcast because of Alzheimer\u2019s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264961,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1208,57,9,24,55,54,16824,56,1577],"class_list":["post-264960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-media","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-news-anchors","tag-ny","tag-retirement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}