When it comes to being at the center of public scandals and professional downfalls, Chris Cuomo is more than a little familiar. He was notoriously fired from his high-profile position at CNN after an internal review determined him culpable for using his journalistic position to gain information about the women accusing his brother and then-Governor of New York Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment. The younger sibling has been adamant about his termination being wrongful, to the point where he’s suing the news org for millions upon millions. But in a new interview, he addressed how he had to change his mental state from the time of his firing, as he stated with possible hyperbole that he wanted to kill everyone, including himself, as it was happening.
Chris Cuomo appeared on the latest podcast installment of Open Book with Anthony Scaramucci, hosted by the financier who famously spent a ten-day stretch as Donald Trump’s White House Comms Director. Their conversation touched upon a variety of different subjects, though a lot of the topics hovered around that controversial period, with Cuomo having to transition from CNN’s top dog to taking on a new kind of series at Fox’s NewsNation. Saying he knows he’s far from perfect, Cuomo shared a self-assessment that tapped into the rage and despair he felt after getting fired.
I make a lot of mistakes. Sometimes for good reasons, sometimes for bad reasons. I’m very flawed. There’s damage that’s relatable to people, there’s damage that’s unrelatable to people, that I have to deal with, that I try to deal with, that I do the work on. I still fail. And I’ve learned to accept it. I had to accept, because I was gonna kill everybody, including myself. Things can consume you. Italians are so passionate. And I really had to fight against that.
Cuomo followed that up by explaining that he advises his kids to not idolize him or think of him as anything beyond someone to learn a few things from, even if not all of that knowledge is entirely positive. To that end, he seemed to be speaking of his own views on brother Andrew Cuomo when reflecting on what he wished he’d been told years ago. In his words:
I wish I didn’t have to go through the same cycle that so many of us do, where you put everyone in your life up on a pedestal. Because when they fall, that rebound effect is usually too dramatic. And if i’d just had clearer eyes from the beginning, it would have made more sense sooner.
Cuomo also addressed his self-awareness that speaking about such things publicly can always lead to his thoughts and words being misconstrued, as has happened previously in his career. He and others have also quantified such comments by putting the onus on their Italian heritage being a cause of heightened emotions.
Scaramucci knows quite a bit about such public downfalls and career transitions, though he bounced back from his Washington D.C. stint in all kinds of ways, such as popping back onto the small screen for reality TV journeys through CBS’ misery-infused Special Forces and the same network’s Celebrity Big Brother, which he may or may not have quit. Cuomo’s shift took him from CNN to Fox’s NewsNation, where he currently hosts the titular program [Cuomo] that’s less focused on partisan politics and is crafted to appeal to more centrist viewers.
Though he may have, albeit hypothetically, wanted to put the lethal kibosh on CNN during his termination, it hasn’t taken away from his respect of the company as a whole. And he’s come to accept that he’ll likely never hit the same career highs that he did while on the network. Though don’t expect him to pull his lawsuit or anything. As he put it:
I’ll never be that again. That was taken from me, I believe, wrongly. I’ll litigate that. I’m not gonna bitch about it in the press. I’m not gonna badmouth CNN because I love the people there, and I wish them well. It’s, I believe, the best news organization in the world. But I don’t like how it I was fired. I’ll litigate that. That’s arbitration, and I’m seeing that through.
The anchor hosts [Cuomo] every weeknight on NewsNation at 8:00 p.m. ET, regardless of whether audiences will be as big as CNN's or not.
