Advertisers Drop Fox News, Tucker Carlson After He Called White Supremacy A Hoax
Fox News and host Tucker Carlson are losing more advertisers.
Long John Silver’s will no longer advertise on Fox News, as confirmed on Aug. 8 to Media Matters’ Angelo Carusone.
Nestlé and HelloFresh, which have advertised on Carlson’s show in the past, told The Hollywood Reporter the same day that they were no longer running ads on the show. Nestlé said it had no plans to do so in the future.
On Aug. 9, Stein Mart confirmed that it is no longer running ads on Carlson’s show.
A spokesperson for SoFi, a personal finance company that had recently been running ads with Carlson, told HuffPost in mid-August that the company buys “programmatic advertising and [does] not purchase directly through the sponsorship of any shows.” Additionally, SoFi said it had “made sure our ads will no longer air during this program.”
And on August 13, the co-founder of sleep app Calm tweeted that the brand was no longer advertising on the show.
Computer brand Dell withdrew support for Carlson on Monday, claiming that the views of the show are “inconsistent with our values and commitment to diversity and inclusion” in a statement to Sleeping Giants.
In early August, Carlson claimed on his show “Tucker Carlson Tonight” that there is no white supremacy problem in the United States and that it’s a “hoax” proliferated by the media.
“The whole thing is a lie,” said Carlson. “It’s actually not a real problem in America.”
The conservative commentator’s remarks came after two mass shootings in 24 hours last weekend. The gunman who killed at least 22 in El Paso, Texas, reportedly posted a white supremacist manifesto online shortly before the shooting. In light of that and Carlson’s history of repeatedly giving airtime to white nationalist conspiracy theories and talking points, #FireTuckerCarlson began trending on Twitter.
In an apparent coincidence, Carlson announced that he would be taking some time off from his broadcast that same night. He also told his critics to “calm down.”
Fox News has stayed silent on the controversy. CNN’s Oliver Darcy reported on Wednesday night that none of the channel’s board members ― including Rupert Murdoch, Lachlan Murdoch, Jacques Nasser, Anne Dias, Roland Hernandez and Paul Ryan ― agreed to comment on Carlson’s rhetoric.
HuffPost has reached out to Fox News directly and has also asked Carlson’s remaining advertisers to comment on their partnerships with his show.
In December 2018, Carlson lost more than 20 advertisers after suggesting that immigrants are making the United States “dirtier.” He never issued an apology and later doubled down on the racist sentiment.
Carlson lost even more advertisers in March after Media Matters released audio revealing white nationalist rhetoric he used during various appearances on shock jock Bubba the Love Sponge’s show between 2006 and 2011.
This story has been edited to reflect updates from other advertisers and with comment from SoFi.
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This article originally appeared on HuffPost.
