Will Sean Hannity be the next Bill O’Reilly?
Hannity has been talking out of his ass for YEARS, but it looks like his latest fake news scandal may have crossed the line as it has a LOT of advertisers jumping ship!
Cars.com, Casper mattresses, Leesa Sleep, sports equipment company Peloton, security company Ring, and Veteran insurance company USAA have all pulled their ads.
Related: Fox News Host Bob Beckel Fired Over ‘Insensitive Remark To An African-American Employee’
Crowne Plaza Hotels told Buzzfeed News their spots were never meant to air on Hannity and that they have no plans to advertise on Fox News “for the foreseeable future.”
So what is all this about?? Donald Trump‘s favorite story: fake news.
In case you generally choose to keep Hannity’s voice out of your ears (and as usual we could not possibly blame you), here’s a brief recap:
The controversial story is about a Democratic National Committee staffer named Seth Rich, who was sadly the victim of an unsolved murder in 2016.
Last year some conservative propagandists fabricated a conspiracy theory in which Seth was murdered because he was the one who leaked the DNC emails to WikiLeaks.
No actual evidence has ever been put forward supporting the story, but fringe right wing media outlets love it because it takes the Trump campaign’s possible collusion with Russia out of the equation, implying that this slain Democrat who can’t defend himself was the one who interfered with the election.
Meanwhile Fox News has been desperate to cover anything other than the horrible missteps Trump is making on the reg.
So last week when a new development in the story surfaced, Hannity jumped on it, blasting the story to millions of TV viewers.
Related: This Is The Trump Story Hannity Was Avoiding BTW
But the “development” turned out to be the snake eating its own tail; the man quoted by Fox News as saying there was new evidence revealed he didn’t have any — he had just heard that secondhand from a Fox News reporter. Ouch. Fox News later retracted their article, saying:
“The article was not initially subjected to the high degree of editorial scrutiny we require for all our reporting. Upon appropriate review, the article was found not to meet those standards and has since been removed.”
Meanwhile poor Seth Rich’s family had to see their late loved one’s name dragged through the mud as a scapegoat (or scapedonkey in this case).
To his credit, Hannity DID eventually give in and announce he would drop the subject. But he didn’t say, as the Fox News site’s retraction did, that the story was inaccurate, only that:
“Out of respect for the family’s wishes, for now, I am not discussing this matter at this time.”
That isn’t good enough, Sean. You know what you’re doing, implying to your viewers it’s just an emotional issue, not that the story is complete and total bullshit.
Luckily, it seems advertisers can smell it as well.
Hannity is currently away on what Fox is calling a planned vacation. We’ll see…
[Image via FOX News.]
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