LifeZette Editor-in-Chief Laura Ingraham theorized Tuesday that embattled CNN President Jeff Zucker is driving his network to obsessively pursue unsubstantiated Trump-Russia connections “to atone for his past sins of giving any platform whatsoever to Donald Trump” during the 2016 election.

CNN is still reeling after the news outlet published a story Thursday falsely tying Trump adviser Anthony Scaramucci to a Russian investment fund. The network retracted the story and issued an apology Friday. CNN announced Monday that three of its employees connected with the story had resigned.

Ingraham said that Zucker and the network Trump has dubbed “fake news CNN” have pushed the limits of anti-Trump coverage to make amends for the backlash it received for covering Trump’s early campaign rallies and holding more interviews with Trump than his presidential competitors.

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“Jeff Zucker, president of CNN — he came under fierce criticism by the Left after Donald won the presidency because they said CNN acted as a megaphone for Donald Trump, covering every rally,” Ingraham said. “So he was going around giving interviews to Harvard Institute of Politics. He was on other panels. The students are getting up and saying, ‘But you did this.'”

Ingraham wondered whether Zucker’s excuses for the Trump coverage controversy influenced CNN’s decision to go full-throttle in exploring the Russia narrative.

“You get the sense that he is trying to atone for his past sins of giving any platform whatsoever to Donald Trump,” Ingraham said, noting that CNN “force[d] out three of its vaunted journalists from its highly acclaimed and relatively young — newly retooled, I should say — investigative unit. Do you think this is just the tip of the iceberg?”

“What they should really do? They should atone for their sins and write a tell-all book about CNN. That would be great. I’d love to see that,” Ingraham suggested for the three displaced CNN employees.

During an October 2016 interview with Washington Post political correspondent Lois Romero at the Harvard Institute of Politics, Zucker addressed the criticism that he and the network gave Trump too large a platform in their coverage of the GOP primaries.

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“I’d say that if we made a mistake last year, it’s that we probably did put on too many of [Trump’s] campaign rallies in those early months un — you know, unedited — and just let them run,” Zucker said, noting that CNN aired the rallies “because you never knew what he was going to say. You never knew what was going to happen.”

“So, there was, there was an attraction to put those on the air. And I think, in hindsight, we probably shouldn’t have done that as much,” Zucker admitted. “However, I do not believe and I totally reject the idea that that’s how he got the Republican nomination. I don’t think that putting on his campaign rallies was what drove him to the Republican nomination. So I think we shouldn’t have done that, and I’ve acknowledged that before.”

Zucker insisted that it wasn’t his or CNN’s “role” to “have any regrets” about the election coverage because 14 million voters chose Trump to be their nominee in the Republican primaries.

“And so, they made their choice. And I don’t think it’s our role to pass judgment on the decision that the party made,” Zucker continued.

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The CNN boss also pushed back against criticism from allies of Hillary Clinton who complained about the emphasis placed on Trump.

“[Trump] was doing interviews with us all the time. I mean, he was more available than certainly any of his competitors. He was far more available than Hillary Clinton was, you know,” Zucker argued. “I really reject this idea when people say he wasn’t asked about his views on things. Now, his views on things may have changed from interview to interview. But he was asked about them all the time, and that’s what those interviews were.”

At a November 30 event again at the Harvard Institute of Politics, GOP primary candidates’ campaign officials shouted Zucker down when he attempted to justify CNN’s coverage.

“I don’t remember getting invited to call in, though,” Sarah Isgur Flores, Carly Fiorina’s deputy campaign manager said, as Politico reported. Others chimed in, shouting, “We didn’t get that call.” “We’d be invited for eight seconds.” “At 2 o’clock in the afternoon we’d be invited on.”

In response, Zucker argued, “All of the Republican candidates were invited to come on … Cable news in general, CNN in particular, should not be held responsible for the fact that Donald Trump said yes to those interviews.”

Senior Mike Huckabee adviser Chip Saltsman responded, shouting, “That’s not true, you can’t keep saying that.” (go to page 2 to continue reading)[lz_pagination]