Anderson Cooper regrets doing Trump townhall — here's why

On Wednesday, May 10 in New Hampshire, CNN hosted a townhall with Donald Trump. During the event — which was moderated by CNN's Kaitlan Collins — the former president and 2024 GOP presidential frontrunner falsely claimed that the 2020 election was "rigged."

CNN has drawn vehement criticism on the left for giving Trump a platform for promoting false information, while some Trump supporters in right-wing media have accused Collins of conducting a "gotcha" interview.

CNN's Anderson Cooper discussed that townhall during a New York Times Magazine interview published in Q&A form on September 5. And Cooper, who moderated a CNN townhall with Trump in February 2016, said that had the decision been his, he would not have OK'd the May 2023 event.

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Cooper told the Times, "I personally would not have chosen to do a townhall. The townhall format is a specific format that CNN has done effectively for a lot of candidates. I don't think the first time Donald Trump came back on CNN — I wouldn't have done a townhall. And if he'd said no, I would have said, 'Fine, then he's not on.' But that's not my choice. I wasn't involved."

According to Cooper, CNN had a "steep learning curve" in "figuring out how to deal with" Trump — who, he lamented, is "completely willing to lie and lies repeatedly and often."

"There's a shamelessness in that and only so much you can do about it from a reporting standpoint," Cooper told the Times. "Then there's questions about, well, should there have been a townhall? Should there have been a live event? Should there have been an audience? All those are completely fair."

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The full New York Times Magazine interview with Anderson Cooper is available at this link (subscription required).