Former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan vowed Friday that his new company will cover the former President Trump’s legal woes differently than the media has thus far.
“We will stop with this charade that this is a legal story,” Hasan said Friday evening in an interview on NewsNation’s “Cuomo.”
“Like you and I both worked in cable for many years, you longer than me,” Hasan told host Chris Cuomo. “There’s some great legal analysts, some great lawyers and prosecutors on air, many of them are friends of mine. But I think it’s a mistake to frame this story as a legal story.”
Hasan’s new company, “Zeteo” will cater to the progressives and seek “answers for the questions that really matter, while always striving for the truth,” according to a Substack website for the company.
He pointed out the Supreme Court’s recent decision to pick up the issue of whether former President Trump can be criminally prosecuted for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, calling it a “political story” rather than a legal one.
“This is a Supreme Court, which has a conservative supermajority, which has perhaps two stolen seats, has three members of the court appointed by the guy who they’re gonna be ruling on and one of them, his wife was involved in the coup attempt.” Hasan said, appearing to be referring to the wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, Ginny Thomas, who has faced scrutiny for a possible role in the lead-up to the Jan. 6, 2021 riots.
“That is a political story,” he added. “These are politicians in robes. These are not disinterested jurists. So, that’s one way I would cover this story differently.”
The progressive commentator also recently told The Washington Post that he has raised $4 million for his venture.
“This is one of the biggest news years of our lives, and that’s why I wanted to do something like this,” Hasan told the Post. “I’m not a businessman. I’m not an entrepreneur. I’ve never done anything like this before. It’s a huge gamble.”
His new venture, he said Friday, will allow him to be his “own boss,” which he said was a major perk after announcing last year he was stepping down from his role at MSNBC. His decision was linked to the news organization’s decision last year to cancel his late-night opinion talk show.
NewsNation is owned by Nexstar Media Group, which also owns The Hill.