Manhasset resident Anthony Scaramucci was offered a job in Donald Trump’s administration in the spring. Then the offer was taken away.
The Port Washington native was reportedly out of politics. Then Trump tapped him to become ambassador to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris.
He was then the subject of a CNN story that said he met with a Russian investment fund executive four days before Trump’s inauguration and it was being investigated by the Senate Intelligence Committee.
Then the story was retracted.
Finally, the New York Post reported he threatened CNN with a $100 million libel suit.
And then Scaramucci denied it.
In the last few months, Scaramucci’s time as an outspoken Trump supporter and a member of the president’s transition team has been a seesaw with him recently denying that he threatened to take legal action against the news organization for printing “fake news.”
On Fox and Friends, Scaramucci, often referred to as “the Mooch,” said reports of him threatening to sue CNN were “exaggerated,” saying he had “ a couple of conversations with senior staff at CNN” and reminded them about his legal background.
“I didn’t go to sue them or anything like that,” he said on the morning show. “I think that got a little overblown to be honest.”
However, on Tuesday, the New York Post, citing anonymous sources, said the network caved in a retracted the story after Scaramucci said he would sue.
Three CNN staffers, Pulitzer Prize-nominee Thomas Frank, Pulitzer Prize-winner Eric Lichtblau and Lex Haris resigned after the news organization retracted the story.
The Post’s story said the three staffers were “urged to resign.”
After retracting the story, CNN wrote, “The story did not meet CNN’s editorial standards and has been retracted.”
CNN also disabled links to the story and issued an apology to Scaramucci.
In a tweet Saturday morning, Scaramucci said, “@CNN did the right thing. Classy move. Apology accepted. Everyone makes mistakes. Moving on.”
He did not respond to an email seeking comment.
CNN had a procedure in place for anonymous sources, which required a sign-off by an executive editor before the story is published.
According to a leaked memo published by BuzzFeed News, Rich Barbieri, the executive editor of CNNMoney, said “no one should publish any content involving Russia” without approval from him and other top editors.
Scaramucci was originally slated to become White House’s public liaison to the business community, but he sold his investment firm, SkyBridge Capital, to a Chinese conglomerate with strong ties to China’s ruling Communist Party. Administration officials said Scaramucci’s appointment would have taken three months to be cleared of ethics conflicts.
The sale reportedly netted him $180 million.
Despite once calling Trump an “inherited money dude from Queens County” and clashing with him on other issues, Scaramucci has constantly defended Trump on television and Twitter.
