Chris Cuomo of CNN breaks silence on his brother’s scandal.

For CNN, the conundrum of the Cuomo brothers was painful on several levels.

Chris Cuomo apologized in May after it emerged that he had offered advice to Andrew Cuomo’s aides as the governor faced sexual harassment accusations. The host pledged not to discuss his brother’s travails, but CNN kept him on the air, roiling some colleagues who considered his role a glaring conflict of interest.

It did not help that CNN had openly encouraged the brothers’ on-air rapport at the start of the pandemic, when viewers tuned in to see Chris Cuomo interview Andrew Cuomo about his response to the pandemic.

On his Monday show, Chris Cuomo said the situation involving the governor’s scandal was “unlike anything I could have imagined.”

“I’m not an adviser; I’m a brother,” he told viewers. “I wasn’t in control of anything. I was there to listen and to offer my take. And my advice to my brother was simple and consistent: own what you did, tell people what you’ll do to be better, be contrite, and, finally, accept that it doesn’t matter what you intended. What matters is how your actions and words were perceived.”

Chris Cuomo has also faced scrutiny over his involvement in the efforts by Andrew Cuomo’s aides to stave off the growing scandal. On Monday, the CNN host said: “I never attacked nor encouraged anyone to attack any woman who came forward. I never made calls to the press about my brother’s situation. I never influenced or attempted to control CNN’s coverage of my family.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/17/business/media/chris-cuomo-cnn-andrew-cuomo.html