Former CNN President Jeff Zucker ordered employees during then-President Donald J. Trump’s administration not to investigate the theory that the coronavirus pandemic was sparked by a lab leak in China, calling it a “Trump talking point,” according to a report.

A “well-placed CNN Insider” told Fox News Digital that Zucker issued the directive in the early stages of the pandemic.

On March 13, 2020, Harmeet Kauer, a “culture writer” for CNN, called the notion that the virus may have started in a laboratory a “fringe theory.”

Her colleague, Scottie Andrew, on April 13, 2020, wrote an article entitled “Nearly 30% in the US believe a coronavirus theory that’s almost certainly not true” in regards to the lab leak theory. It included the subheading, “Its origin is up for debate, but it wasn’t made in a lab.”

“There’s still much we don’t know about the coronavirus pandemic, but virus experts agree on one piece of its origin story: The virus likely originated in a bat, not in a Chinese lab,” he wrote.