Elon Musk at a Tesla factory in Germany.
Photo: Sebastian Gollnow/picture alliance via Getty Images/dpa/picture alliance via Getty I
It’s a tough job market out there for former CNN hosts who have been fired for cause and removed from their anchor slots. Take Chris Cuomo, who has taken a position with NewsNation and is now sitting for interviews with fellow ousted anchor Tucker Carlson, an unthinkable prospect in his CNN days. Or look at Don Lemon, who has not been working since he was fired last April after making misogynistic comments. So when Elon Musk agreed last year to a commercial partnership hosting Lemon’s talk show on X, it seemed like a good deal. Surely, the multi-multibillionaire who has spurned most of his celebrity-based contacts would deliver on the deal, no?
Well, no. On Wednesday, Lemon announced that “Elon Musk has canceled the partnership I had with X” just hours after their interview together for the show. According to Kara Swisher, Musk sent a brief message (“Contract terminated”) to Lemon’s people after their conversation, in which Lemon reportedly asked questions about Musk’s alleged frequent ketamine use. (The term “contract” may not be binding here: Semafor reports that Lemon had not formally signed a deal with the social media app.)
“We had a good conversation,” Lemon said in his statement. “Clearly he felt differently. His commitment to a global town square where all questions can be asked and all ideas can be shared seems not to include questions of him from people like me.”
Soon after Lemon announced the canceled deal, Musk took a break from tweeting about how “woke ideology wants you to die” to respond:
Beyond losing the commercial partnership with X, the latest Musk tantrum appears to be good news for Lemon and his team, who will still publish their show on other platforms. Lemon could consider Musk’s breach of contract the cost of incredible promo for his first episode, which will stream on March 18 and feature the interview his former business partner was so unhappy with. Lemon even managed to get back on his old network for a night: He will appear on CNN at 7 p.m. with clips from his forthcoming Musk interview.
