NewsNation and Mediaite founder and owner Dan Abrams sparred with one of his network hosts, former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, over something the latter said that appeared favorable to former President Donald Trump.
As Cuomo ended his program on Thursday, “Abrams had a friendly joust with his network colleague and old friend, Chris Cuomo, on Thursday after Cuomo attacked a Mediaite article for factually reporting on his own words,” Mediate noted.
The story, “Chris Cuomo Says He’d Consider Voting For Trump: ‘I Am Always Open,'” quoted the host as saying he would be “open” to considering voting for Trump even though he has never had much good to say about the former president.
At the end of his NewsNation program Thursday, Cuomo aired a screenshot of the Mediate story and said, “They didn’t even call me because they don’t want to screw up the headline. They don’t want to screw up the clickbait, and that’s the agenda.”
Right afterward, Cuomo then brought in Abrams, who claims that his network is neutral, though Mediaite definitely skews to the left.
“I’m so glad that you put that up, alright? Put it back up. Put up the headline again from Mediaite, which is a website that I happen to own,” said Abrams, to which Cuomo responded, “No, don’t give Mediaite the attention. Don’t put it up. Don’t put it up.”
“It does feel like you’re kind of backing off of what you said,” continued Abrams.
He added:
You were right at the top of the show when you said more context, right? Your point was that you were critical of Donald Trump in other parts of the interview, but you were asked a very specific question, which is, “So you’re open to a Trump vote?” And your response was, “I’m always open.” And then you went further than that. You even said, “And I’ll tell you this: people say, Oh, B.S., you’ve never voted for a Republican in your life. Wrong. Not only have I, but the first vote I ever cast was for a Republican.” Your point was that you’re open. Was it not? I mean, is that unfair?
Cuomo replied, “The point is that everybody should be open,” before claiming that Trump “made life very hard when he weaponized me and went after my family.”
The former CNN host then added:
Am I open? Yes, I’m open. I then followed it by saying—the part that you mysteriously missed—”If”Donald Trump is banking on me for re-election, he’s got trouble.” Why? Because he’s not my guy, and I’ve said it a million different times and ways, but it’s not my place to tell people to vote for him. Your outlet, and a lot of other ones, did what you often criticize, which is that they didn’t contact me. They didn’t want context.
“Wait, why do they need to contact you? What is there to contact you about?” Abrams said. “You said what you said in the interview. It speaks for itself. What do they have to contact you about?”
“I never said I would consider voting for Trump. I said, ‘I’m open,’” to which Abrams replied, “That is a distinction without a difference!”
“When you are going to cover what somebody said, you call if you’re a responsible reporter and say, ‘Hey, did you say this? And what did you mean when you said this?’” Cuomo insisted.
“What do you mean, ‘Did you do this?’ You’re not denying you said it,” Abrams playfully countered. “You don’t call when someone makes a comment on their show. You don’t have to say, ‘Did you say it?’ You know they said it.”
Cuomo, who is an attorney by education, continued to claim that the headline was “clickbait” and written “grossly out of context” before saying that “if it were a trial,” Mediaite would “get massacred on this.”
WATCH:
.@ChrisCuomo tells @DanAbrams that recent comments he made about possibly voting for Donald Trump were taken "grossly out of context."
More #DanAbramsLive: https://t.co/jC3EBsEViO pic.twitter.com/KgPpr2DG1I
— NewsNation (@NewsNation) December 1, 2023
This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
