Fox News’ Tucker Carlson just proved that even a Fox News host can never go full racist, unless he’s Sean Hannity. Advertisers are reportedly dropping from Carlson’s primetime program Tucker Carlson Tonight after he claimed on his show, on Thursday, that immigrants make America “poorer and dirtier and more divided.”
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Carlson’s show has lost at least 7 advertisers including Bowflex, Pacific Life, employment website Indeed and SmileDirectClub.
I didn’t know that Bowflex was still a thing but it is and, apparently, they are pissed.
“We can confirm that Nautilus, Inc., parent company for Bowflex, has pulled its ads from the Tucker Carlson Tonight show,” the company told THR. “We have requested that Fox News remove our ads from airing in conjunction with Tucker Carlson Tonight in the future. Aside from our decision to remove our ads from his show, we have no other association or affiliation with Mr. Carlson.”
On Monday, SmileDirectClub announced that they didn’t want their advertising running on politically themed cable news programs.
“We are actively working with our media buyers to confirm that SmileDirectClub is no longer running our ads around any political opinion shows,” he told TheWrap.
After Twitter users bombarded Indeed online, the employment websites came out to note that they dropped the show a month ago.
“Hi there, Indeed is not currently advertising on Tucker Carlson Tonight and has no plans to advertise on this program in the future,” read a tweet from the company.
Advertisers apparently didn’t realize that Carlson has always been a lightning rod wedged in the president’s racist ass. Carlson has been nothing if not a walking collection of Jim Crow antics and good-ole-boy-isms. Carlson probably has segregated water in his fridge, which Paris Dennard has allegedly drunk and notes that the ice water for white people is colder.
Fine, he doesn’t have segregated water in his home, or if he does I don’t know about it, but he’s totally made racists comments before, including his accusations that The Root is the real racist.
He also said white people aren’t “designed” to live around immigrants and explained “white genocide” to his alt-right viewership.
Jezebel, our sister site wrote about Carlson’s six-minute racist poop filled rant here:
Even after learning that advertisers were running from his show faster than White House staff can leave Trump’s administration, what did Carlson do? Well, he doubled down, of course, telling his viewers on Monday, “It’s true. The left says we have a moral obligation to admit the world’s poor—even if it makes our own country more like Tijuana is now, which is to say poorer and dirtier and more divided.”
Which makes me wonder, are the advertisers leaving because they disagree with Carlson’s comments, or are they leaving because they’ve been called out? I think we all know the answer to this one.
It’s because they’re being called out.
Oh, and in case you were wondering (I’m sure you were but), Fox News stands by Carlson because they believe in his racist views, too.
“It is a shame that left-wing advocacy groups, under the guise of being supposed ‘media watchdogs’ weaponize social media against companies in an effort to stifle free speech,” a network rep told The Wrap. “We continue to stand by and work with our advertisers through these unfortunate and unnecessary distractions.”