After more than twenty years as a host of ‘Hardball’, the popular but somewhat controversial television host has just announced his early retirement.

This evening, the MSNBC commentator and talk show host Chris Matthews announced that he would be retiring as of today. “Let me start with my headline tonight: ‘I’m retiring,'” Matthews declared, “…I’ve loved every minute of my 20 years as host of Hardball. Every morning I read the papers and I’m gung-ho to get to work. Not many people have had this privilege… I’m very proud of the work I’ve done here.”

Over the course of the past week, Matthews has been publicly apologizing for several controversial mistakes and inappropriate comments, made both recently and over the course of his career on MSNBC. He apologized to Bernie Sanders for a recent off-color remark made about his rise in the 2020 presidential campaign. He has also apologized to African-American Democrat Jaime Harrison for publicly confusing him with African-American Republican Sen. Tim Scott. And this evening, in his announcement of retirement, Matthews both acknowledged and apologized for the inappropriate comments he made to Laura Bassett, a guest on the show, four years ago.

After briefly discussing his plans for writing another book as well as thanking his colleagues, Matthews finished his announcement on a high note. “For those of you who have gotten into the habit of watching Hardball every night, I hope you’re going to miss me, because I’m going to miss you. But remember Humphrey Bogart in Casabalanca: We’ll always have Hardball. So let’s not say ‘Goodbye,’ but ”till we meet again.'”