Former top CNN star Chris Cuomo frequently told his fellow cable news colleague Don Lemon that he loved Lemon like a “brother” during their handoff segments.
Now he’s throwing Lemon and his fellow CNN stars Brian Stelter and Jake Tapper under the bus amid ugly allegations — and is demanding a 9-figure payout from CNN for his alleged unlawful firing.
Cuomo asked an arbitrator to award him $125 million for his firing from CNN, alleging his bosses knew full well how he advised his brother, former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
The newscaster’s team said that his firing was “the epitome of hypocrisy” at the scandal-plagued network.
“As long as CNN’s ratings would not be hurt, [former CEO Jeff] Zucker and [top deputy Allison] Gollust were more than willing to overlook major transgressions by CNN personalities such as Don Lemon and Jake Tapper, or even to engage in blatant misconduct themselves,” the filing read.
It specifically targeted a November 2021 exchange between Lemon and disgraced actor Jussie Smollett over Smollett’s faked hate crime. In a “flagrant breach of journalistic ethics,” Cuomo’s team said Lemon used his position at CNN to gain information on the ongoing investigation and warned Smollett that the Chicago police did not believe his lies.
“Intervening in the ongoing investigation by texting Smollett was an inexcusable breach of ethics,” Cuomo’s filing said. “Yet CNN did nothing; Lemon was not disciplined in any way.”
Zucker fired Cuomo, host of the third-place network’s most popular primetime show, in December after a New York Attorney General’s report publicly revealed new details about how he helped his brother strategize to fight sexual harassment allegations.
“It should be obvious by now that Chris Cuomo did not lie to CNN about helping his brother,” said his lawyer, Bryan Freedman. “In fact, as the limited information released from Warner Media’s investigation makes clear, CNN’s highest-level executives not only knew about Chris’ involvement in helping his brother but also actively assisted the governor, both through Chris and directly themselves.”
There was no comment Wednesday from a representative for Zucker and Gollust. The spokeswoman, Risa Heller, has denied in the past that Gollust, a former press aide to Gov. Cuomo, offered advice or counsel to the governor while she worked at CNN.
CNN declined to comment on the filing.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Cuomo interviewed his big brother on CNN nine times — a temporary lift of the network’s policy that Chris Cuomo not participate in stories concerning the governor.
In his filing Wednesday, Chris Cuomo said CNN leadership demanded the interviews even though he and his brother had expressed reservations about them.
He said that Zucker and Gollust tried to strengthen the network’s ties to his brother and pushed the New York governor not to appear on other networks. He said they requested the governor hold his daily briefings at a time CNN’s ratings needed a boost.
“Network standards were changed in a calculated decision to boost ratings,” Freedman said. “When those practices were called into question, Chris was made the scapegoat.”
Cuomo also dragged Tapper into his complaint, claiming he was also never disciplined for incidents seen as ethical lapses — Tapper allegedly tried to help Rep. Conor Lamb, D-P.A., in the 2020 election by talking his Republican opponent out of challenging him.
“And best of luck in your race. For the record, I wasn’t trying to talk you out of running — I was trying to talk you into running in a safer R district! Lol,” Tapper wrote to Lamb’s Republican Sean Parnell in Nov. 2019.
Networks standards were “a moving target,” modified as Zucker and Gollust saw fit, the former “Cuomo Prime Time” host said in the complaint.
Cuomo’s complaint also said his former colleagues had betrayed him, naming Lemon, Tapper, and CNN’s Brian Stelter as some of the alleged participants in a deliberate campaign by the network to discredit him.
With his journalistic integrity “unjustifiably smeared,” Cuomo will find it difficult to find work in his field in the future and seeks damages of $125 million, the complaint said.
Zucker resigned under pressure earlier this year after it was revealed he violated corporate practices by not disclosing his romance with Gollust. She was forced out shortly thereafter.
CNN said this in 2008… but now they’re silent
The Horn editorial team and the Associated Press contributed to this article.