George Stephanopoulos was "abandoned" by ABC in settling with Trump, according to NBC's Chuck Todd.

If George Stephanopoulos were in Chuck Todd's shoes during the legal dispute with President-elect Donald Trump, he would have felt "abandoned."

Todd informed Chris Cillizza of Substack that the incident was astonishing and a gut punch for anyone working at a major media company, as it sets a precedent that may be challenging to break free from.

Todd stated that the purchase was made to silence negative publicity.

Todd stated, "If I were in George's position, I would feel like my network had deserted me."

ABC News and Stephanopoulos were sued by Trump after the anchor repeatedly stated that he was found "guilty of rape" during a heated conversation with Rep. Nancy Mace on the March 10 episode of "This Week." Prior to this, Stephanopoulos hosted the network's Sunday show "Meet the Press."

Despite a jury determining Trump liable for "sexual abuse," which has a specific definition under New York law, Stephanopoulos repeated the claim ten times during his argument with Mace.

On Saturday, a surprising settlement was publicly filed, indicating that the two parties had reached an agreement and avoided a costly trial.

The network will contribute $15 million to a presidential foundation and museum, and also pay $1 million in legal fees for Trump.

Todd admitted he was unaware of the details behind the settlement. According to legal experts, Disney-owned network likely made the decision to prevent potential embarrassment during the discovery process.

"Perhaps there were additional responsibilities that I was unaware of. However, based on what I know, I would feel like I was neglected."

Cillizza responded, "Are we establishing a precedent by accepting donations from companies like Amazon, Meta, and OpenAI to the Trump inaugural fund?"

Todd stated, "Publicly traded companies owning news organizations is not going well."

Planet Chronicle' Brian Flood and David Rutz contributed to this report.