Add The New York Post on Google CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss has been in hot pursuit of former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo to join the network — but sources told The Post that actually hiring him would be a longshot.
Weiss has set her eye on Cuomo while trying to lure new talent to CBS — courting him over meals and multiple text conversations, sources said — but there’s little chance the anchor, who is suing CNN for $125 million, will get hired.
“Bari really wants Chris Cuomo — like, really. She is obsessed with him and they text,” one source said.
“She wants him but can’t have him because of the CNN litigation,” the person added, nodding to the fact CBS’ owner Paramount Skydance is currently seeking to clear the last hurdles to its merger with CNN parent company Warner Bros. Discovery as Cuomo’s protracted legal battle continues.
“She’s definitely not a moron but she is absolutely a TV ignoramus,” the source said of Weiss. “It demonstrates she wants what she wants irrespective of reality and history, and it demonstrates she can’t have what she wants because of reality and history. Reality and history win every time.”
A source close to Weiss pushed back on that characterization, saying the exec is well aware of the CNN lawsuit and other complications related to hiring Cuomo. The person also described the talks with Cuomo as in their “pre-infancy.”
“She respects his work,” the person said, adding that there were “no conversations saying, ‘We want to hire you.'”
Cuomo joined CNN in 2013, with a mission to revive the network’s moribund morning show “New Day,” and went on to helm a top-rated primetime show.
He was fired in December 2021, prompting a lawsuit from the anchor. He accused the network of wrongful termination after ti learned he’d secretly aided the defense of his bro, former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, as the pol faced sexual misconduct allegations.
Chris Cuomo went on to join NewsNation, a move that was widely viewed as a step down.
Aside from the lawsuit, Cuomo’s past with former CNN boss Jeff Zucker could pose a challenge to a hypothetical CBS hire of him.
Multiple sources told Page Six last year that they believed Cuomo got his then-boss Zucker fired for not disclosing his relationship with the network’s chief marketing officer Allison Gollust, who eventually stepped down. Cuomo denied the accusation.
Zucker is now the CEO of RedBird IMI, the media and investment arm of RedBird Capital. The buyout fund headed by Gerry Cardinale is helping finance Paramount’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.
Another complication to the Cuomo courtship is that he’s locked into a multiyear contract with NewsNation, as noted by Status, which first reported Weiss’ pursuit of the 56-year-old broadcaster.
Since joining CBS News in October, she has been on the lookout for new talent to inject energy into the last-place network.
She and CBS News President Tom Cibrowski have been planning a shakeup of “CBS Mornings.” They’re considering a slew of candidates, including Norah O’Donnell, to fill the anchor seat left open by Tony Dokoupil, who jumped over to “CBS Evening News” in January.
There’s also chatter that Gayle King, who’s on a one-year contract, and her co-host Nate Burleson, who is currently locked into a multi-year deal, could decamp.
