CNN closes offices to most workers over Omicron fears

CNN has announced it is closing its offices to non-essential staff amid a surge in Covid cases and not long after critics highlighted a ‘maskless’ holiday network party.

If an employee’s job does not require them to be in the office, then they should work “elsewhere,” network head Jeff Zucker said in a Saturday memo, first reported by the Wall Street Journal. The decision has been made out of “an abundance of caution.” 

Changes are also being made to newsrooms to minimize the amount of people “in our spaces,” he said. The network will return to using smaller-scale studios and remote technology as it had previously done in response to the pandemic. A tentative return to office date has been set for January, according to the WSJ’s report. 

CNN has a “zero-tolerance policy” on vaccine requirements, and three staffers were fired after not getting inoculated and showing up at the office in August. CNN host Brianna Keilar, who is “double vaccinated and boosted,” recently announced she has “symptomatic Covid.”

Masking is also required for employees, unless they are eating or drinking or by themselves. 

The network has received criticism on social media since last week, with many poking fun at a slew of office holiday party pictures posted to social media by host Jake Tapper and his fellow employees that show maskless staffers (though Tapper and others insist this was only for pictures).