Laura Ingraham Loses Fox News Sponsors After Defending Notorious White Supremacist
Laura Ingraham is taking a hit at Fox News after offering a defense for notorious white supremacist Paul Nehlen, who had been kicked off Twitter and other social media outlets for open displays of racism.
The host of Ingraham Angle had displayed a graphic this week showing prominent conservative voices that had been censored on social media. One of those included on the list was Paul Nehlen, who has openly advocated neo-Nazi views.
The reaction was swift. Many shared the graphic and condemned Ingraham, who has a history of racially charged comments and defense of racists. The photo-printing service Fracture announced that it was pulling advertising from Ingraham’s show, saying that the defense of Paul Nehlen went against the company’s values.
“Last night one of our ads aired during an episode of The Ingraham Angle during which Laura Ingraham expressed alarming views that run entirely counter to the values that we hold as a company,” the statement read.
“We are taking this matter very seriously and as a result we are taking swift action.”
As the left-leaning site Think Progress noted, Ingraham’s defense of other conservative voices was controversial as well. Her graphic was meant to show censorship against conservatives, but many of those featured had been kicked off social media sites for promoting harassment against enemies and advocating violence. Another person included on the graphic, right-wing pundit Milo Yiannopoulos, had defended pedophilia.
Laura Ingraham has found herself at the center of controversy before. After NBA star LeBron James offered what many believed to be a light criticism of Donald Trump, Ingraham attacked him, saying that an athlete should not be sharing political views and admonishing him to “shut up and dribble.” Critics pointed out that Ingraham did not have such criticism for celebrities with right-wing views, including rocker Ted Nugent. Others pointed out that Donald Trump himself was a reality television star before becoming president.
Laura Ingraham promoted a white supremacist on her show. At least one advertiser is pulling out. https://t.co/6xqImOiFkh
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) June 1, 2019
Ingraham was the subject of another boycott last year after she mocked Parkland shooting survivor David Hogg when he shared that he had been rejected from a preferred college. Hogg led a boycott of Ingraham and Fox News that led several advertisers to pull out and prompted an apology from Ingraham. As USA Today noted, Hogg successfully led a second of round of boycotts after Ingraham’s controversial defense of Donald Trump’s immigration policy that separated migrant children from their parents and sent the children to detention centers.
