Inside the Battle for CNN: Jeff Zucker, David Zazlav, Chris Licht and 18 Months of Crazy Backstabbing
25.07.2023 - 17:31
/ variety.com
Jeff Zucker was breezing through the Faena Hotel in Miami Beach when he spotted David Zaslav across the room. The former CNN chief was there on vacation on March 31, while the current Warner Bros. Discovery CEO was on hand for the Saudi-backed FII Institute’s Global Priority Summit.
As corporate leaders mingled with Saudi princesses, Zucker approached Zaslav with tears in his eyes. Zucker complained that Chris Licht, his CNN successor, was unfairly maligning him in the press, according to sources familiar with the conversation. Zucker insisted he would never deploy such a low-blow tactic.
It was a strange claim given that, to that point, Licht had only done a single published profile with The New York Times’ James B. Stewart, in which Zucker was never mentioned. Zaslav stopped him.
Instead, he wanted to know if Zucker was indulging in a different “fantasy,” as Zaslav put it — to assemble a team of investors to try to buy the network. Zucker vehemently denied that he had any desire to do so. But sources tell Variety that the opposite is true, and that Zucker has spent the past year traveling the globe to meet with potential partners in a bid for CNN.
Zucker and Zaslav’s power struggles over the cable news network — one of the most prestigious assets in the WBD portfolio and also one of the biggest perennial headaches for the parent company — shed light on the chaotic and roiling environment Zucker left behind after his 2022 ouster. The former network chief, who was forced out after failing to disclose a romantic relationship with a CNN subordinate and for committing ethical breaches in the newsgathering process, likely will fail in any bid to take back the network. But his battles with Zaslav and his behind-the-scenes
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