Justice Department, FBI investigating Cuomo nursing home scandal
FOX News correspondent Bryan Llenas details the allegations on 'The Story'
The liberal primetime hosts on CNN and MSNBC overwhelmingly kept their focus on Sen. Ted Cruz while virtually ignoring the growing legal woes plaguing Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
With Texans still struggling following deadly winter storms that have devastated the state's power grid, the Republican senator landed in hot water late Wednesday after pictures emerged on social media showing him and his family flying to Mexico for vacation. Cruz flew back to Houston the next day amid the backlash. He later admitted it was a mistake.
CNN and the governor's brother, Chris Cuomo, have made an unprecedented push to downplay and deflect from the Democrat's controversies, with the far-left network giving its developments little to no airtime -- and giving Chris Cuomo free rein to conduct friendly, comical interviews with the scandal-plagued governor.
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Cuomo's administration is reportedly under investigation by the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Brooklyn after critics accused officials of covering up the true number of COVID nursing home deaths in the state. Early in the pandemic, the governor ordered assisted living facilities to accept COVID-positive patients in order to keep hospital beds free.
While both Cruz and Cuomo generated unflattering headlines, only one of them dominated the coverage during CNN and MSNBC's primetime lineups. And it wasn't Cuomo.
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The embattled governor earned less than three minutes of coverage across the six most-watched shows on the liberal networks. The GOP senator, however, collectively earned over a whopping 46 minutes of coverage.
There has been growing criticism of CNN's Cuomo for avoiding the scandals plaguing his brother, which according to the network is barred from covering his relative after admitting they lifted the "rule" in the early months of the pandemic for the host to conduct chummy interviews. He did, though, make room to repeatedly attack Cruz on his show.
Cruz confronted the CNN anchor about his brother's nursing home controversy in a fiery shouting match last September.
Don Lemon spent more time trashing Cruz than any other host, dedicating a stunning 12 minutes and 24 seconds on the subject during his first hour of "CNN Tonight." Lemon, a good friend of his colleague Cuomo, has also been avoiding the New York controversy.
Anderson Cooper was the only host on either CNN or MSNBC during the primetime slots to even mention the Cuomo scandal, which clocked in at just two minutes and 42 seconds, paling in comparison to the nearly nine minutes he spent on Cruz's blunder.
Over on MSNBC, hosts Chris Hayes and Lawrence O'Donnell also piled on the GOP senator. The "All In" host spent nearly 13 minutes of his hour-long show berating Cruz while the "Last Word" host did the same for over eight minutes.
Conversely, both Hayes and O'Donnell, as well as their primetime colleague Rachel Maddow, have continued their blackout of the Cuomo scandal.
There was a similar trend of coverage on the three broadcast networks on Thursday evening.
ABC's "World News Tonight" dedicated nearly four minutes to the GOP senator's round trip snafu and just 55 seconds to the Democrat's growing legal controversy.
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NBC's "Nightly News" similarly gave Cruz more coverage during its broadcast than Cuomo, devoting two minutes and eight seconds to the senator and one minute and 41 seconds to the governor.
CBS' "Evening News" was the only network evening news program to dedicate more time to the nursing home scandal, giving it nearly two minutes as opposed to the one minute and seven seconds it devoted to the Cancun trip.