Here’s the ‘Puff Piece’ Chris Cuomo Ran in 2017 to Allegedly Silence an Accuser

Three days before Jeff Zucker fired Chris Cuomo last year, CNN received a letter from an attorney for one of Cuomo’s former coworkers. Per the New York Times, it alleged that while he worked for ABC News, he harassed her and that he “badgered her for sex, and after she declined, he assaulted her, she said. She ran out of the room.”

The letter alleged Cuomo later contacted her “seemingly out of the blue” while he was working at CNN during the height of the #MeToo movement. It claimed the host offered to do a favorable segment about her employer, which turned out to be a public relations firm working for WeWork.

According to the letter, the woman attempted to ignore Cuomo. However, CNN ended up running the segment.

The Washington Free Beacon flagged the clip, which it dubbed a “corporate puff piece,” in an article published Tuesday, describing the segment this way:

Between segments on President Donald Trump’s tax plan, which would be signed into law four days later, and a blackout at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport that grounded more than four hundred flights, New Day anchor Chris Cuomo—his smiling face appearing above a banner that blared “‘WeWork’ Helps Veteran’s Vision Come True”—lauded the real-estate company for “doing the right thing” even when it didn’t “have to.”

Not surprisingly, Cuomo did not explain the segment’s supposed raison d’être. In a statement to the Beacon, a CNN spokesperson declined to comment saying the issue “may be related to litigation.”

Throughout 2021, Zucker gave Cuomo a fair amount of leeway as revelations mounted about the host’s involvement in strategy sessions with his brother and then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who was facing sexual misconduct accusations of his own. The contents of the letter appeared to be the final straw.