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Post by the Scribe on Jul 14, 2020 14:53:28 GMT
Top writer for Fox News host Tucker Carlson resigns
CNN
10.2M subscribers
The top writer for Fox News host Tucker Carlson has for years been using a pseudonym to post bigoted remarks on an online forum that is a hotbed for racist, sexist and other offensive content, CNN Business learned this week.
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Post by the Scribe on Jul 14, 2020 20:14:08 GMT
POLITICS 07/13/2020 09:55 pm ET Updated 3 hours ago
Tucker Carlson Announces ‘Vacation’ After Top Writer’s Racist, Sexist Posts Revealed
The Fox News host said the show didn’t “endorse” Blake Neff’s anonymous posts, then he announced he’d be going trout fishing for the rest of the week.
By Carla Herreria Russo
Fox News’ Tucker Carlson addressed the resignation of Blake Neff, a writer for Carlson’s show who quit soon after a CNN report revealed racist and sexist comments he had posted online.
Carlson admitted to the viewers of his show on Monday night that “what Blake wrote anonymously was wrong.”
“We don’t endorse those words,” Carlson said. “They have no connection to the show. It is wrong to attack people for qualities they cannot control.”
At the end of his show, the Fox News host announced that he would be going on a previously planned trout-fishing vacation for the next few days.
According to a report from CNN Business, Neff had been posting messages under a pseudonym on the AutoAdmit message board.
His posts included racial slurs and rants against Black people, as well as continuous posts sent over five years about a woman he mocked and insulted, CNN Business reported.
While Carlson distanced himself and Fox News from Neff, the Fox News host also denounced people who criticized Neff for his explicit posts.
“We should also point out to the ghouls now beating their chests in triumph at the destruction of a young man that self-righteousness also has its costs,” Carlson said, in part. “We are all human. When we pretend we are holy, we are lying.”
Carlson’s fishing trip announcement isn’t the first time he’s said he was taking a break amid controversy. In August 2019, he claimed that white supremacy was a “hoax” and not a real problem in the U.S., sparking calls for his firing. In the face of that backlash, Carlson announced at the end of his show he would be taking more than a week off the air.
Other Fox News hosts have taken similar breaks in the face of controversy.
Bill O’Reilly went on vacation after news broke of his sexual harassment settlements, and he eventually left Fox News without returning to his show.
Fox News Media CEO Suzanne Scott and President and Executive Editor Jay Wallance sent out an internal memo to all employees condemning racist, misogynistic and homophobic behavior.
“We want to make abundantly clear that Fox News Media strongly condemns this horrific racist, misogynistic and homophobic behavior,” the memo said. “Neff’s abhorrent conduct on this forum was never divulged to the show or the network until Friday, at which point we swiftly accepted his resignation. Make no mistake, actions such as his cannot and will not be tolerated at any time in any part of our work force.” www.huffpost.com/entry/fire-tucker-carlson-vacation_n_5d4b9a5ee4b01e44e474f1da
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