Good evening, and welcome back to In The Room.

Earlier this morning, I brought you inside Jason Kilar's contentious meeting with the Jeff Zucker loyalists inside CNN's Washington bureau. Tonight, we turn our attention to new developments in the ongoing drama over the CNN chief's February surprise ouster and why WarnerMedia believes it has closed the book on the Zucker question. 

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Is There Another Zucker Shoe?

Despite contrary reports, WarnerMedia’s investigation into Jeff Zucker is a closed matter. So if there is another shoe to drop, they aren’t dropping it.

In the last 48 hours, WarnerMedia C.E.O. Jason Kilar has traveled to New York, Washington and Atlanta to try to quell the anger among CNN staff who are fiercely loyal to Jeff Zucker, their now-former president, and dubious about Kilar's motives for Zucker’s abrupt and merciless ouster. Their unyielding sympathy for a man who admittedly violated company policy by failing to disclose a romance with his comms chief Allison Gollust has raised some eyebrows in media circles, but it's indicative of an undeniable truth at CNN: whatever his flaws, successes, and failures, Zucker had earned a Confucian-level of filial piety from those whose careers he had helped to create and cultivate.

In any case, Kilar's effort was futile. His meeting in Washington devolved into insinuations that he was exacting revenge on Zucker for whatever hand the CNN chief may have had in the WarnerMedia-Discovery merger, which will almost certainly result in Kilar’s departure from the company once that deal closes. Throughout today, dozens of CNN executives, on-air talent and off-air insiders reached out to me to echo the sentiment put forth by Dana Bash in last night's meeting in D.C. ...

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