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Hot Mic Moment: CNN Producer Caught Joking About Donald Trump’s Plane Crashing

By Tara West
Published on: 15:30 PST, Dec 2, 2016

A CNN producer has been disciplined after she was caught on tape joking about President-elect Donald Trump’s plane crashing. The producer made the joke just moments before correspondent Suzanne Malveaux was slated to go live. Following the hot mic moment, a CNN statement revealed that the producer had been “disciplined” but did not provide the name of the producer in question.

FTV Live posted footage of CNN correspondent Suzanne Malveaux’s crew waiting to cover President-elect Donald Trump’s press conference at the Carrier Corporation headquarters in Indiana. While waiting for the president-elect to arrive, an off-camera producer made an inappropriate remark about Trump and Mike Pence.

The woman could be heard off screen joking about the plane which had Trump and Pence on board crashing. The joke began as the crew discussed the hand motion that the producer would make to signal that Trump had arrived and was on his way to the conference. However, the producer didn’t stop there. She then seemingly made another hand motion which could not be seen from the camera angle while laughing, noting “that means his plane’s crashed.” Shortly after making the remark, the woman can be heard saying “just kidding.”

However, after the video was made public, CNN responded by calling the joke “unfortunate and inappropriate.” The network noted that the producer, which they did not name, had been disciplined. However, the disciplinary actions were not outlined.

“An unfortunate and inappropriate remark was made by one of our producers off camera yesterday. We have apologized to the Trump transition team, and the Producer has been disciplined.”

The Daily Mail reports that Suzanne Malveaux is not facing any disciplinary action for her part in the exchange. The Trump campaign has not responded to the post and there have been no tweets by the president-elect about the matter.

Trump was in Indiana to give a speech at Carrier International following negotiations with the company which will keep about 1,000 jobs in the state of Indiana that were slated to move overseas. CNN’s website reports that Carrier ultimately decided to keep some of its jobs in the state after they were offered “incentives” by the state. The tax breaks appear to be key in the decision.

The publication notes that the Carrier International deal could be representative of Trump’s broader strategy to keep jobs within the United States. During his campaign, Trump noted that he wanted to provide tax cuts to businesses in a bid to make it easier for companies to make profits while staying in the United States. He also signaled that he would place harsh tariffs on companies that manufactured their goods outside of the U.S.

Trump’s treasury secretary pick Steven Mnuchin has claimed that Trump and Pence’s move to make a deal with Carrier is unprecedented. He notes that both the president-elect and vice president-elect picked up a phone and actually made a call to the Carrier CEO.

“The President-elect and the Vice President(-elect) picked up the phone and called the CEO of the United Technologies and told them we want to keep jobs here. Can’t remember the last time a president did that.”

It was also noted that while Trump is a touted negotiator, it was Mike Pence who also played an integral part in the Carrier deal. Pence used his position as governor of Indiana to help ensure the tax breaks were made possible, ultimately shaping the way for the deal which will allow hundreds of citizens across Indiana to keep their jobs at the manufacturing facility.

What do you think about the producer’s hot mic moment?

[Featured Image by Scott Jones/YouTube]

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