CNN journalists avoided mentioning the most sordid elements of President Donald Trump’s past—including his felony conviction and two impeachments—during inauguration day broadcasts after the network’s top boss told them to show some deference to the most powerful person on earth.
That’s according to a report in media news publication Status, authored by the well-sourced erstwhile CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy.
During a routine editorial meeting on Sunday, meant to plan the extensive logistics of an inauguration, CNN CEO Mark Thompson told journalists to avoid “pre-judging Trump,” Status reported.
In addition to instructing them to keep an open mind about Trump’s second term—three days in, the president has already launched attacks on birthright citizenship, pardoned violent insurrectionists, and withdrawn from the World Health Organization and Paris climate agreement—Thompson told his journalists he does not want CNN’s “coverage to relitigate the past.”
Among those in attendance were Jake Tapper and Anderson Cooper, star anchors who have long reported on Trump’s record of scandals, opining at length on everything from sexual misconduct allegations made against him by over two dozen women to his attempts to overturn the 2020 election.
That previous coverage, however, came under the leadership of former boss Jeff Zucker, who threw the weight of CNN at Trump during the president’s first term in office, allowing on-air talent to directly address his stream of falsehoods.
Thompson would have none of that and urged talent to withhold expressions of indignation aimed at Trump or his conduct.