News Anchor Drops Not One, but Two Curse Words First Day on Air (Video)
North Dakota news anchor A.J. Clemente had a rough first day on Sunday evening when his first live on-air words were "f--king s--t."
The West Virginia graduate on-air gaffe occured just as NBC affiliate KFYR-TV began its evening broadcast and seconds before co-anchor, Van Tieu, was set to introduce him as the most recent addition to the newscast.
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When asked to tell the viewers a little bit about himself, it became very obvious Clemente had a bad case of the first-day jitters.
"Um, thanks Van. I'm very excited," he said. "I graduated from West Virginia University and I'm used to, um, you know, from being from the in, the east coast."
The slip came just a day after Red Sox slugger David Ortiz dropped one of the same, albeit much more intentional expletive while rallying fans at Fenway Park five days after the Boston Marathon bombings.
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FCC chairman Julius Genachowski excused the profanity, but Clemente's bosses aren't being as understanding and have suspended him until resolving the situation.
"He did not realize his microphone was on, but still, that's no excuse. WE train our reporters to always assume that any microphone is live at any time. Unfortunately, that was not enough in this case. WE can't take back what was said," KFYR-TV news director Monica Hannan wrote on the station's Facebook. "The person involved has been suspended until we resolve the situation. All we can do at this point is ask for your forgiveness."
And Clemente is asking the same, while making sure viewers understand he only said two offensive words, not three.
After admitting his first day "couldn't have gone any worse," he tweeted: "I just want to say that I did not say the word gay. I was trying to pronounce the London Marathon winners name Tsegaye Kebede." Here's the inappropriate blooper:
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