Happy Tuesday, I’m Eriq Gardner.

Welcome back to The Rainmaker, my private newsletter focused on the legal maneuvering inside Hollywood, Silicon Valley, Washington, and Wall Street.

This week, I write about a libel suit that’s quietly causing hell for CNN and Anderson Cooper. There’s a good chance this high-stakes case goes to trial soon. Plus, a last-minute deal between Big Tech and the music industry; Donald Trump’s real privilege; and Tom Girardi’s affair with a judge.

But first…

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The saga dates back to 2016, when a popular West Palm Beach heart surgeon named Dr. Michael Black sued CNN and star medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen over reporting on infant deaths at St. Mary’s Medical Center, where he worked. The network had reported, both online and on Cooper’s show, that the mortality rate for open-heart surgery at the hospital was “three times the national average”—an eye-catching statistic that Black alleges is deeply flawed and dishonest. Black further claims that experts had repeatedly warned CNN that its methodology effectively cherry-picked data by focusing only on the highest-risk procedures, and that CNN ignored these warnings. Indeed, according to Black, there was no statistically significant difference between St. Mary’s “secret deaths,” as CNN reported, and the national average. Nevertheless, St. Mary responded to the bad press by shutting down its pediatric cardiac surgery program. (CNN settled a separate lawsuit in Georgia brought by the hospital’s former chief executive, David Carbone, who was forced to resign after the exposé was published.)...