CNN staffer who resigned over retracted Russia story named interim head of CBSNews.com

Keith J. Kelly

One of the three CNN staffers who resigned in June 2017 over a retracted story about alleged collusion between Russia and members of Donald Trump’s campaign staff has resurfaced at CBS News, according to an internal memo at CBS announcing six appointments.

Lex Haris, the former head of CNN Investigates, an elite unit inside the newsroom, is now the interim head of CBSNews.com.

CNN retracted the story and accepted the resignations of reporter Thomas Frank, editor Eric Lichtblau and Haris, the unit’s executive editor, a day after the story was retracted in mid-June 2017.

The piece, citing a single anonymous source, claimed that Congress was probing a “Russian investment fund with ties to Trump officials.”

CNN said it retracted the story because the information was not “solid enough” to publish. The network did not cite any factual errors or mistakes in the piece but did issue an apology to Anthony Scaramucci, a financier and a former Trump transition team official.

The story had called Scaramucci an intermediary to investors.

Scaramucci, known as The Mooch, became White House communications director the following month — but was infamously out after 11 days.

Haris, who had been running CBS’ MoneyWatch on an interim basis, replaces Nancy Lane, who was promoted to VP and senior executive producer, programming and development.