Johnathon O’Halloran, the 28-year-old morning anchor at NBC affiliate WJAC-TV, announced on Instagram on Monday, September 14, 2026, that the next morning’s edition of “6 News at Sunrise” would be his last at the Johnstown, Pennsylvania, station, ending a run of more than two years behind the desk.
“It’s bittersweet to say that tomorrow, Tuesday, will be my final day at WJAC. Over the last two years and some months, I’ve been honored to sit at the desk for a station with such a rich history and to get to know so many wonderful people across this ten-county community,” he wrote on Instagram.
“To everyone at home, thank you for trusting me to be a part of your day and to keep you informed about the stories that matter most,” he continued. “It’s a responsibility I’ve never taken lightly, and I’m incredibly grateful for the memories and experiences I’ve made here.”
“I’m excited for what’s next, but for now, I hope you’ll join me one more time Tuesday morning on 6 News at Sunrise,” he added, closing the post with, “Thank you for everything.” He gave no reason for the departure and named no next employer.
Two Years at the Sunrise Desk
O’Halloran joined WJAC in June 2024 and became one of the familiar faces of the station’s early-morning newscast, which reaches a 10-county stretch of west-central Pennsylvania that includes Punxsutawney. “Today marks two years for me at WJAC! Crazy how time flies!” he posted in June. His last shift in the studio was Tuesday, September 15, the morning after the farewell post went up.
From Woodbridge to the Anchor Desk
He grew up in Woodbridge, New Jersey, and graduated from Xavier University in Cincinnati in 2020 with a bachelor’s degree in communications and digital media. For four of those years he wore the school’s two mascot suits, D’Artagnan the Musketeer and the Blue Blob. He worked in radio before television, as a producer and a fill-in sports talk host.
Before Johnstown he worked in New York City as an assignment editor at WPIX, where his station biography says he handled coverage of Donald Trump’s civil fraud and hush money cases, the arrest of an alleged Long Island serial killer, the 2022 Twin Parks apartment fire in the Bronx and the 2022 Sunset Park subway attack.
The Emmy in his biography is a specific one. In 2023 he won a New York Emmy Award for producing an in-depth piece on an alleged cancer cluster at Colonia High School in New Jersey, a story that drew national attention after more than 100 former students and staff reported brain tumors, and that prompted state environmental and health testing of the school grounds in 2022. Those tests found no radiological hazards. Colonia sits inside Woodbridge Township, where O’Halloran grew up. The award is a regional New York Emmy, not one of the national primetime or news and documentary Emmys.
A Second Job in New York Radio
Pennsylvania mornings were not the whole of O’Halloran’s workload. He has continued to anchor newscasts for iHeartRadio in New York, a dual role that kept him moving between a small-market television desk and a big-city radio newsroom.
He said he was honored to take part in special coverage marking the 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, explaining that he grew up close to New York City and that the events of that day rank among his earliest memories. By his own account on social media earlier this year, he also reported from New York on a pretrial hearing in the case against Luigi Mangione, at which a judge ruled certain evidence out of the trial to come.
What the Exit Leaves Behind
WJAC, a Sinclair Inc. station, still lists morning anchor Valory Myers, chief meteorologist Caitlin Westerholm and news anchors Sean Eiler and Jen Johnson on its on-air roster, along with meteorologists, multimedia journalists and a Centre County reporter.
For a market the size of Johnstown, a young anchor’s exit carries weight. Morning newscasts in smaller markets tend to be where journalists build the reel that gets them hired somewhere bigger, and O’Halloran’s two-track career — local television in Pennsylvania, radio news in New York — had already put him in front of national stories while he was still reading local headlines at dawn.
Viewers filled the comments under the farewell post with congratulations. “I’m so proud of you, my friend!” one wrote. On Facebook, another was more wistful, calling it sad to see him go and wishing the region could hold on to young talent, while allowing that wanting to advance a career was understandable. That comment captured the double edge of the announcement: a send-off for the anchor, and one more empty chair at a small-market morning desk.
