US broadcaster CNN fired anchor Chris Cuomo on Saturday after new evidence pointed to the journalist’s greater involvement in the strategy of his brother Andrew Cuomo, former New York governor, to respond to allegations of sexual harassment, according to the US newspaper The New York Times.
Earlier this week, CNN had already suspended its prime-time anchor indefinitely, a day after the publication of the documents that based the report in which the former governor is accused of sexually harassing 11 women — he resigned a week after the disclosure.
This Saturday, the station released, through a statement, its final decision. “We hired a respected law firm to do the analysis [dos documentos] and we fired him, with immediate effect,” says the text, according to the American newspaper. “In the process of this analysis, additional information came to light. Despite the dismissal, we will investigate them as appropriate.”
The ad completes a surprising downfall of Chris Cuomo, who since 2018 has run the network’s prime-time show, “Cuomo Prime Time.” Before that, he’d built a successful career on American TV—he’d worked at ABC News until he moved to CNN in 2013 to present a morning broadcast as one of Jeff Zucker’s first big signings to head the network.
It was the president, by the way, that, until the last month, Chris Cuomo had the support, without any disciplinary measures applied for his involvement in his brother’s defense strategy, a breach of the network’s rules. At least once, Zucker defended the journalist saying he was human and faced “very particular circumstances,” according to the New York Times.
The station’s position, however, changed when the unpublished materials were released on Monday (29). Copies of text messages and emails, as well as testimonies from the former governor and his closest advisers, contradict what Chris Cuomo stated.
To investigators, the CNN anchor insisted that he never manipulated coverage or made suggestions to other journalists to benefit the former governor. He told viewers that he acted only as a brother to “listen and give advice,” urging the Democrat to tell the truth, whatever it was, and eventually to step down.
Due to the access he has to various sources inside and outside the American press, the journalist was sued by former aide Melissa DeRosa — who left office two days before Cuomo — as she tried to control, in early March, the journalists who investigated the harassment stories. “Never mind,” was Chris Cuomo’s response, according to the American newspaper.
Days later, she wrote to him again after learning that a reporter for The New Yorker magazine was preparing to run a story, asking the CNN anchor to check the information.
Also in March, the journalist also approached DeRosa via text message, saying he was “panic” over the way his brother’s team was handling the allegations and asked to help prepare Andrew Cuomo before writing proposed statements for the then governor to read.
He also asked his advisor to trust him and urged them to stop hiding details. “We are making mistakes that we cannot [cometer]”, he wrote at one point, according to the newspaper.
Chris Cuomo even sought out the former advisor after a New York Times report about a harassment committed at a wedding. The journalist wrote saying he had a clue that the woman was acting to hurt the former governor’s image — which was not true, he admitted to investigators.
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