It only took a year before Morgan found himself embroiled in his first major controversy at The Mirror. The day before England was set to play Germany in the Euro '96 football championships, The Mirror ran a headline and photo on its front page that many did not find amusing. Above a doctored image of two English players wearing World War II helmets was the headline "ACHTUNG! SURRENDER! For you Fritz, ze Euro 96 Championship is over." Next to it was a letter written by Morgan himself in the style of Neville Chamberlain. Reportedly, Morgan also planned a publicity stunt that involved driving a tank to the German embassy. In the ensuing uproar about the headline, that stunt was cancelled. Suddenly, Morgan found himself in a position his hard-charging personality didn't seem suited for - apologizing. There were fears the kind of attitude promoted by the headline may incite acts of violence during the games. Though Morgan was apologizing, he was right where he wanted to be - at the center of attention.

In 2000, though, the attention turned from an editorial decision he had made to a personal financial scandal. A competing newspaper published a story alleging that Morgan bought 20,000 pounds worth of stock in a computer company - and that he made the purchase just before The Mirror ran a piece naming the stock as a good buy. An inquiry began, and it was decided that while Morgan had breached an ethical code of conduct, he could keep his job. Other Mirror employees weren't so lucky - the columnists who wrote on stock buys lost their jobs, and it was another four years before Morgan was cleared of wrongdoing. However, it did later come out that he bought additional stock under his wife's name - another 70,000 pounds worth. By the time that revelation came about, Morgan was already on the skids at The Mirror.

As editor, he had been leading the charge against the Iraq War in the British press, loudly criticizing then Prime Minister Tony Blair for his support of the war. Among the stories published on the war under Morgan's leadership was a piece that included a photo of British soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners. As recently as a 2016 BBC interview, Morgan defended the photos, saying they were real and that the British government had a "vested interest in getting rid of me, their biggest thorn in the side about the war." But The Mirror didn't defend them strongly in the wake of the allegations they were fake ... the British people instead got a paper with a large headline that stated "Sorry ... we were hoaxed." And the man who had okayed the publication of the photos was subsequently out of a job. When Morgan's firing was announced, staff members at the paper were in tears. After nearly a decade, Piers Morgan's reign at The Daily Mirror was over.

True to form, though, he didn't slink away into the night. Instead he became a regular feature on people's TV screens. Though he had already been appearing on TV before leaving the newspaper business, Morgan stepped up his involvement with broadcast media after his firing. One of the first offers Morgan received for a regular TV gig was via a text message from Simon Cowell. And in 2006, America welcomed Morgan into their homes as he served as a judge on America's Got Talent. He also judged Britain's Got Talent, and appeared on then-just-a-mogul Donald Trump's reality show The Celebrity Apprentice. Morgan won his season of The Celebrity Apprentice, and in the process became close friends with now-President Donald Trump. Morgan said all along he believed Trump would be President, and has been outspoken about his dislike for the protests that erupted after Trump's election. Morgan's diatribes on the subject have even led celebrities to decline interviews with him. But Morgan knew what opening his mouth could lead to. He's no stranger to the ins and outs of the American political and media institutions - he served as the host of a primetime show on CNN for several years, after all.

When Larry King announced his retirement in 2010, Morgan was named as the replacement for the longtime, iconic American host. The show started strong, with Morgan able to book some of the biggest names in media and politics for interviews. Oprah, Rudy Guiliani, Ricky Gervais, Condoleeza Rice, and even two of the Kardashian sisters ... And he made just as many headlines for the interviews he didn't do. Madonna was deemed too old to appear on his show and banned from ever being a guest. But all the initial hype wore off quickly. Morgan had a different style from King, and he was a British person taking over an American news and interview show. Ultimately, he only lasted three years in the host's chair, as poor ratings doomed him to failure. He's attributed the show's failure to a clash of cultures, citing such factors as his own outspoken opposition to guns as one such example of cultural differences that just couldn't be bridged.

The CNN show wasn't Morgan's only project during that time period. He was also hosting 'Life Stories' for ITV, whose subjects were as diverse as Sharon Osborne and the Prime Minister. Now, he's the permanent co-host for Good Morning Britain where he keeps himself in the spotlight, most recently sparring with a gender fluid guest over the validity of gender fluidity. In his classic blunt style, Morgan asked the 21-year-old guest: "If you can identify as who the hell you like can I literally look at myself and say ... I'm an elephant today."