According to Cincinnati, Ohio-area Fox affiliate WXIX-19, CNN reached a settlement Tuesday with Covington Catholic High School student Nicholas Sandmann for an undisclosed amount in federal court.
The news brings to an end a dispute nearly a year after CNN decided to falsely tar and feather Sandmann and his fellow students as racist rascals following a January 18, 2019 confrontation with the less-than-truthful Native American activist Nathan Phillips on the National Mall.
Fox 19 said that “[t]he amount of the settlement was not made public” and was a piece of a $800 million suit Sandmann brought against “CNN, the Washington Post and NBC Universal.”
The piece noted the settlement would not affect Sandmann’s legal actions against the other two outlets.
Sandmann attorney Lin Wood added that his client would also sue newspaper chain giant Gannett. According to Fox 19, that suit will be brought “in the next 60 days.”
Here’s more from Fox 19 recapping the hearing:
Sandmann’s attorneys talked about the “emotional distress, damage to reputation and distress to his family” that Nick has and will continue to suffer.
Attorneys say the money they’re seeking is not designed to compensate Nick, but to “deter the defendants” from doing the same thing (that they’re accused of) in the future.
The decision comes as the Jeffrey Zucker-led left-wing activist network faced yet another year of pathetic media coverage, cementing a sordid legacy of being a home base for former Obama officials to air grievances about the Trump administration, and generally refusing to seriously engage the body politic as a real news organization.
As NewsBusters reported at the time, CNN and fellow liberal cable outlet MSNBC dedicated 53 minutes and 20 minutes in the first weekend (January 19-20, 2019) after the confrontation with CNN host S.E. Cupp being arguably the worst (click “expand”):
CNN devoted the most time on the incident, giving 18 minutes and 16 seconds to the original version between Saturday and Sunday morning.
S.E. Cupp spent almost seven minutes Saturday night on her Unfiltered show, lashing out at the “mob of MAGA hat-wearing high school students” who are “clearly...not getting a good education” with parents being failures “because it makes little sense to angrily chant ‘build the wall’ to a population with literally zero illegal immigrants who were here long before we were.”
To Cupp’s credit, she issued a tweet Monday morning saying she’s “truly sorry” for “reacting too quickly to the Covington story.” If only her colleagues would do the same.
On the Monday afterward (January 21), CNN continued its belligerence. Then-Early Start co-host Dave Briggs blamed the students for the entire matter, ruling the fact that Sandmann and other students had donned MAGA hats for the “overreaction.”
And for two more examples, January 22, 2019, featured weekday afternoon CNN Newsroom host Brooke Baldwin and correspondent Miguel Marquez appearing to shrug off the fact Sandmann and his fellow students were facing threats to their lives.
Hours later, Cuomo PrimeTime host “Fredo” Cuomo spewed a repugnant strain of venom in the direction of Sandmann and his friends (and Trump supporters everywhere), deeming them “victims of their own choices.”
So, congrats were in order to Baldwin, Briggs, Cuomo, Cupp, and Marquez for this lawsuit being settled...or something.
>>To see all NewsBusters coverage of the attacks against the Covington kids, go here.<<
