CNN anchor Chris Cuomo has been working from home after being diagnosed with COVID-19 at the end of March — and he appears to have hit the existential part of quarantine. On Monday, Cuomo expressed major frustrations with his role in journalism, politics, and what it means to be a celebrity on his SiriusXM show. The very next day, he back-peddled on those remarks, but let's dive in to his original commentary, shall we?
“I don’t like what I do professionally,” Cuomo said on air. “I don’t think I mean enough, I don’t think I matter enough, I don’t think I can really change anything, so then what am I really doing?” He further explained that his experience with COVID-19 has made him rethink his values and question what he does. “I don’t want to spend my time doing things that I don’t think are valuable enough to me personally,” he continued. “I don’t value indulging irrationality, hyper-partisanship.”
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The CNN host went on to say that he doesn’t want to spend his time “trafficking in things that I think are ridiculous.” For Cuomo, these things include “talking to Democrats about things that I don’t really believe they mean" and “talking to Republicans about them parroting things they feel they have to say.”
But that’s not all he said. Cuomo recounted an exchange he had with a “loser biker” who confronted him on Sunday while he was outside despite his coronavirus diagnosis. “I don’t want some jackass, loser, fat tire biker being able to pull over and get in my space and talk bullshit to me, I don’t want to hear it,” said Cuomo, adding that he wishes he wasn't a celebrity in that moment so he could tell the man what he really thought. “That matters to me more than making millions of dollars a year...because I’ve saved my money and I don’t need it anymore.”
However, just as quickly as he let out his existential frustrations on-air, Cuomo took it all back on his show the following day. Well, almost all of it. Rather than feeling like he was “being perceived as successful in a system that I don’t value,” the news anchor said, “I’ve never been in a better position professionally, I’ve never been more grateful, I’ve never been on a better team.”
Cuomo addressed the outburst and change of heart, adding that he had no intention of leaving CNN, just that he questioned how much of a difference he was making in his job. “It is frustrating to do this job in an environment where people are not interested and open. It is hard to practice journalism when people are so intent on believing what they want to believe for political advantage,” he continued. “I was talking about having legitimate questions. Is the way I do this working? If it’s not working can I do it differently, do I want to do it differently? Would that work?”
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Cuomo has been a host of his own show, Cuomo Prime Time, on CNN since 2018. Before that, he was a co-host of CNN’s morning show New Day for five years. During the coronavirus pandemic, he has frequently brought his brother, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, on the show to give updates on the United States’ largest COVID-19 outbreak. The two brothers have gone viral for their lighter banter and family spats about things like whether they call their mother enough.
Clearly, Cuomo is doing a lot of deep thinking while recovering from coronavirus and quarantining with his family. Everyone talks about missing friends, baking banana bread, or whatever show is trending, but far fewer want to talk about how existential it can get when you’re left alone with your thoughts for too long.
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