Former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), who worked as a CNN contributor, suggested that the network might not have fired him if former President Donald Trump was still in office.
What he said: Santorum said that CNN, during the Trump era, wanted to have a well-respected Republican on their team that disagrees with Trump, as he did, and once he left office, the network no longer needed the addition.
“Once the value that I brought to the network was less because Trump wasn’t in the news very much anymore, they decided it wasn’t worth it. The juice wasn’t worth the squeeze,” he said, according to Yahoo News.
Santorum claimed that his criticism of Trump was honest.
“I felt my responsibility to the country, not to CNN, but to the country, was to call it as I saw it and hold Trump to the values that I think are important for the country … I would call him out and say, you know, this is not what I would do, and this is not how a president should behave.”
Santorum noted that that sometimes, he agreed with the former president and defended him, which, according to him, “used to drive [CNN] crazy.”
“But with Trump gone, then my utility was pretty much diminished,” he said. “They made a business decision that you know, look, ‘as an asset, he’s not as valuable to us as he used to be.’”
How we got here: Santorum, who started working at the network as a contributor in 2017, was fired in late May this year after he drew backlash for comments he made about Native Americans. He made the remarks at a Young America’s Foundation event.
“We birthed a nation from nothing. I mean, there was nothing here,” Santorum said at the time. “I mean, yes, we have Native Americans, but candidly, there isn’t much Native American culture in American culture.”
According to a CNN senior executive who spoke to Huffington Post, CNN “quietly ended its contract with Santorum” after he “blew it” with his explanation of his comments during an appearance on “Cuomo Prime Time.”
Santorum told host Chris Cuomo that he “misspoke” and explained he was talking about the founding of the U.S.
"I wanted to give you a chance to explain yourself, because that's what this show is about."
Tonight @ChrisCuomo asked Rick Santorum about Santorum's widely-condemned comments on Native American culture – here's the entire clip pic.twitter.com/yXZeIsGnpd
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) May 4, 2021
“I think after that appearance, it was pretty clear we couldn’t use him again,” the executive told the outlet.
In an appearance on Fox News, Santorum similarly explained he was “not at all disparaging toward Native Americans.”
“What I was talking about is the founding of the United States of America. Native Americans did not have a role in the founding of our country,” he said.
