The well-established, anti-Trump bias exhibited by CNN throughout the president's tenure comes from the top, CEO Jeff Zucker, according to conference calls secretly recorded by Project Veritas over the past two months.
In the first batch of edited recordings released Tuesday night, Zucker is heard Oct. 9 instructing staff to "lean into" Trump's "erratic actions" as he recovered from COVID-19.
"I just want to re-emphasize that, you know, I think we cannot normalize what has happened here in the last week with Trump and his behavior," Zucker says. "And I go back to what David said, David Chalian said, that this is a president who knows he's losing, who knows he's in trouble, is sick, maybe is on, the after effects of steroids or not. ... I don't know but he is acting erratically and desperately, and we need to, we need to not normalize that."
Zucker says it's "what we've come to expect for the last three and a half years, four years, but it clearly is exacerbated by the time that we're in and the issues he's dealing with."
"And I think that we cannot just let it be normalized. He is all over the place and acting erratically. And I think we need to lean into that."
O'Keefe explained that a CNN insider helped coordinate the recordings of the conference calls.
In the Oct. 9 call, Zucker warns against CNN "repeating unsubstantiated smears" from the "right-wing media."
And he advocates attacks on leading Republicans.
"Franky if we've made any mistake, it's been that our banners have been too polite, and we need to go well after Lindsey Graham. ... There's a lot of news out there, and Lindsey Graham really deserves it," the CNN chief says.
"Each of these so called 'scandals' for Trump. Each of these things, we should just once again be careful to say that this is the one is going to undo him with his voters."
Another executive, Marcus Mabry, vice president of global programming, attacks Fox News' Tucker Carlson.
"If you're going to talk about the story, I think it's unavoidable that you have to talk about the naked racism of Tucker Carlson. Because that's really what drove this anti-diversity push, you know, Trump watches Tucker Carlson's show and then reacts," he says.
BREAKING: Special Correspondent @JamieGangel Details How @CNN Should Cover Up Trump’s Contested Election Claims On 9am Call
“News organizations have to be very careful & very responsible about not giving @realDonaldTrump too much of a platform on his not conceding...”#CNNTapes pic.twitter.com/LoCqh79pOG
— James O'Keefe (@JamesOKeefeIII) December 2, 2020
Zucker, in an Oct. 16 call, alludes to the Hunter Biden email scandal reported by the New York Post and the unmasking of Lt.Gen. Michael Flynn by top Obama administration officials, including Joe Biden, indicating CNN should not cover those stories.
Fox News reported: "Zucker's message on dismissing the Hunter Biden controversy appeared to have later resonated with his star anchor Jake Tapper, who said Oct. 22 that the allegations against Biden's son were 'too disgusting' to repeat on air and that the 'rightwing is going crazy.'"
CNN said in a statement regarding O'Keefe's recordings that "legal experts say this may be a felony" and the network has "referred it to law enforcement."
O'Keefe appeared later Tuesday with Fox News Sean Hannity.
The host asked: "They peddled this Russia lie for three years over there. They never apologized, they never corrected the record, and they reported fake phony news and advanced conspiracy theories. ... Is this a news organization to you?"
O'Keefe replied: "No, Sean. This is something that doesn't shock people but confirms a lot of suspicions. To see the president of a media conglomerate barking orders at his reporters and journalists, telling them what to cover, what not to cover. That's not anything resembling journalism I know."
O'Keefe said he runs an organization with a few dozen reporters, and they "come to me with facts."
"They're not yessing me. In fact, they're challenging me. And what Jeff Zucker is doing on these phone calls is telling people what the story is, telling them what not to cover," he said.
"This is propaganda! ... We've never actually seen it -- fly on the wall, you can actually hear the president of the company instruct his vice president, instruct his reporters what the narrative ought to be. This is the farthest thing from journalism that I know. And I think that CNN owes an apology to the people. I mean, this is disgraceful," O'Keefe said.
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