CNN: ‘Death sells’
‘Exploited COV toll for ratings’
The CNN staffer who was secretly recorded admitting the news network used “propaganda” to help get Joe Biden elected president also said the cable channel played up the COVID-19 death toll for ratings — and the order to do so came directly from top brass.
Charlie Chester, a CNN technical director, was filmed by Project Veritas during a series of fake Tinder dates as he explained how “fear really drives numbers.”
“COVID? Gangbusters with ratings,” Chester told the unidentified female “date” working with PV.
“Which is why we constantly have the death toll on the side,” he continued, making reference to the coronavirus death tracker appearing on screen. “It would make our point better if [the COVID death toll] was higher.”
Chester claimed there was a red phone that network President Jeff Zucker would use to call the control room to order producers to play up the COVID death count on screen.
“Like, this special red phone rings and they pick it up and it’s, like, the head of the network being like, ‘There’s nothing that you’re doing right now that makes me want to stick. Put the numbers back up. Because that’s the most enticing thing that we have.’ So things like that are constantly talked about,” Chester said.
The Project Veritas undercover, who reportedly told Chester she was a nurse, went on five dates with the CNN staffer, including the final one at a coffee shop in Chester’s neighborhood. It’s unclear when the dates took place.
At one meeting, Chester explained why the network went so heavy on COVID coverage, saying, “Fear is the thing that really keeps you tuned in.”
Going on to reference the death toll, Chester then said he had “a major problem with how we’re tallying how many people die every day, because I’ve even looked at it and been like, look at it and be like, ‘Let’s make it higher.’ Like, why isn’t [it] high enough, you know, today?”
“And I’m like, what am I f--king rallying for? That’s a problem that we’re doing that,” he conceded.
He also told the woman there is “no such thing as unbiased news,” and explained how that manifests itself at CNN.
“Any reporter on CNN, what they’re actually doing is they’re telling the person [being interviewed] what to say. It’s always, like, leading them in a direction before they even open their mouths,” he said.
“And the only people we let on air, for the most part, are people that have a proven track record of taking the bait.”
A CNN spokesperson did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment on the second part of the Project Veritas report.
In Part One of the PV series, Chester was seen revealing that his network produced “propaganda” to oust former President Donald Trump in the 2020 election.
“Look what we did, we [CNN] got Trump out. I am 100 percent going to say it, and I 100 percent believe that if it wasn’t for CNN, I don’t know that Trump would have got voted out,” Chester said, adding that he came to work at CNN because he “wanted to be a part of that.”
“Our focus was to get Trump out of office, right? Without saying it, that’s what it was.”