Former CNN President Jeff Zucker resigned after disclosing a consensual relationship with fellow executive Allison Gollust. WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar visited staffers in the company’s New York and Washington, D.C bureaus.
During Kilar’s visit, The New York Times’ Michael Grynbaum shared a transcript of anchor Jake Tapper questioning the CEO. According to the transcript, Tapper contested if Zucker’s firing had anything to do with former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo.
“If you could address the perception … that Chris Cuomo gets fired by CNN, Chris Cuomo hires high-powered lawyer who has a scorched-earth policy, who then makes it very clear to the world that unless Jeff gives Chris Cuomo his money, they’re going to blow the place up,” Tapper said.
“Stuff starts getting leaked to gossip websites about Jeff and Allison … and then weeks later, Jeff comes forward and discloses this and resigns, not willingly.”
Tapper stated that it could seem that Cuomo intimidated Zucker and came out on top, so the former anchor “blew the place up.” “How do we get past this perception that this is the bad guy winning?” Tapper asked.
“This is Chris Cuomo’s revenge, and it worked,” a media insider told TheWrap. “It was done deliberately.”
As CNN now heads into the post-Zucker era, Kilar stated CNN’s reporting and on-air content would “define” the company. “I know that answer doesn’t sit well with probably a lot of people in this room, but I believe it to be the case,” Kilar said.
Eduardo Razo is the Assistant Content Editor for BNM, which includes writing daily news stories on the news media industry. He can be found on Twitter @eddierazo_ or you can reach him by email at eddie1991razo@gmail.com.
