New CNN CEO Reveals How Network Will Cover Trump After 2024 White House Announcement

New CNN CEO Reveals How Network Will Cover Trump After 2024 White House Announcement
(L-R) Donald Trump, who was then a Republican presidential candidate, gestures as Texas Sen. Ted Cruz looks on during the Republican Presidential Debate, hosted by CNN, at The Venetian Las Vegas, in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Dec. 15, 2015. (Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images)
Jack Phillips
11/17/2022
Updated:
11/17/2022
0:00

Chris Licht, CNN’s new top executive, said his channel will not cover former President Donald Trump as much as during his White House term and 2016 campaign.

“We have fact-checkers ready to go. We will put things in perspective. We will not let everything he does consume the news cycle, right?” Licht told “On with Kara Swisher.” “There are other things that are important.”

Licht claimed that under former CNN executive Jeff Zucker’s direction, the network covered Trump ad nauseam and “let every little thing that he did consume everything, and so you ended up talking about him for eight hours a day.”

“And we’re not going to do that,” Licht said, noting that Trump raised CNN’s ratings during his presidency. “We’re going to be very clear and take everything on a case-by-case basis about what level of coverage it should be.”

Trump, Republicans, and critics of corporate media said that CNN took a markedly left-wing turn during Trump’s presidency. Meanwhile, the network has had consistently worse ratings than Fox News or MSNBC over the past several years.

A study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences earlier this year show that some CNN shows were “more left leaning” than even some shows on MSNBC.

“Our program-level measures reveal, at least based on the guests that appear on the show, popular primetime news shows on CNN—such as Anderson Cooper 360 or CNN Tonight—are more left leaning than well-known evening shows on MSNBC such as The Rachel Maddow Show or The 11th Hour with Brian Williams,” according to the study.

And it added: “While news shows across all time blocks have polarized since 2017, we find that this pattern is the most pronounced among primetime shows, with Fox News steadily becoming more conservative and MSNBC and CNN sharply becoming more liberal during the Trump presidency.”

On Tuesday night, Trump announced a third run for president at his Mar-a-Lago residence. CNN broadcast the first 20 minutes of his speech before cutting away.

Licht, who has been conducting a business review of CNN for the past six months, said in a memo late last month that sweeping changes will be made in the near future—including layoffs. He made reference to a looming worldwide economic downturn.

“All this together will mean noticeable change to this organization,” Licht said in a memo, CNN reported. “That, by definition, is unsettling. These changes will not be easy because they will affect people, budgets, and projects.”
Jack Phillips is a breaking news reporter with 15 years experience who started as a local New York City reporter. Having joined The Epoch Times' news team in 2009, Jack was born and raised near Modesto in California's Central Valley. Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/jackphillips5
twitter
Related Topics