Well, CNN landed in some hot water today when it was revealed that some of its news crew was joking about President-elect Donald Trump’s plane crashing prior to his visit and press conference at Carrier in Indianapolis yesterday. The deal struck between the fledgling Trump administration and Carrier Corp. kept 1,000 jobs in America in exchange for $7 million in tax breaks over a period of ten years.
CNN’s Suzanne Malveaux appears to be speaking with producers through her earpiece, while another crewmember can be heard giving her hand signals about Trump’s arrival (via Free Beacon) [emphasis mine]:
The CNN crewmember spoke with correspondent Suzanne Malveaux, who was on camera, and said, “If I do this, it means he has landed.”“That means his plane has crashed, no I’m kidding,” the crewmember said with a laugh.
Malveaux smiled in response to the crewmember’s comment for several seconds. Shortly after the joke, Malveaux went live on CNN and reported that the Trump plane was going to touch down soon.
Oliver Darcy of Business Insider reports that CNN has disciplined the producer and offered an apology:
An unfortunate and inappropriate remark was made by one of our producers off camera yesterday," a CNN representative told Business Insider in a statement. "We have apologized to the Trump transition team, and the producer has been disciplined."
I would like to know this producer's name, but the point is that you should never joke about the president-elect dying. In fact, you should never wish death upon the president of the United States. Period. On the other hand, not everyone is happy about the Carrier deal. Staunch Trump supporter former Alaskan Gov. Sarah Palin said that it was an example of “crony capitalism.”