python remove text from string after character(s) without using regex

pivot = '...'
required = text.split(pivot, 1)[0]

regex to find datetime in text format

import re
r = re.compile('(?P<dow>[a-zA-Z]+,) (?P<date>[0-9]{2}) (?P<month>[A-Za-z]+) (?P<year>[0-9]{4}) (?P<hour>[0-9]{2}):(?P<minute>[0-9]{2}) (?P<ampm>[A-Z]{2})')

s = "Monday, 14 January 2019 11:50 PM"

print([m.groupdict() for m in r.finditer(s)][0])

output :

{'dow': 'Monday,', 'date': '14', 'month': 'January', 'year': '2019', 'hour': '11', 'minute': '50', 'ampm': 'PM'}