Former CNN president Jeff Zucker made his first public appearance since leaving the cable news channel on Friday, saying that during his tenure, the network wasn’t “anti-Trump.”
Donald Trump has had many run-ins with CNN, resulting in the former United States president filing a lawsuit against the network. Nonetheless, Zucker wanted to debunk that notion.
“As I said all the time, we were not anti-Trump,” Zucker said at The Un-Convention 2022 (h/t The Hill).
“We were pro-truth. If that came off as anti-Trump because he didn’t tell the truth, I’m not going to apologize for that. You gotta hold both sides accountable. And kick the shit out of both sides.”
Furthermore, Zucker does not believe maintaining both sides liable means lending equal legitimacy to principles on the right and left of the political scope.
“Hold both sides accountable, but recognize that on certain issues like democracy and the future of democracy and whether the election was stolen, there’s not two sides,” Zucker added.
Zucker left his position as CNN president after he failed to disclose a consensual relationship with a fellow senior executive at the network.
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.
