Advertisers are bolting “Tucker Carlson Tonight” after the Fox News host said last week that immigrants are making the United States “poorer and dirtier.”
“We have a moral obligation to admit the world’s poor, they tell us, even if it makes our own country poorer and dirtier and more divided,” Carlson said. He then referenced the poem at the base of the Statue of Liberty. “Huddled masses yearning to breathe free? Nope, cynical shakedown artists who have been watching too much CNN.”
Carlson doubled down on his rhetoric Monday night.
“The left says we have a moral obligation to admit the world’s poor. Even if it makes our own country more like Tijuana is now, which is to say poorer and dirtier and more divided,” he said.
“That’s what we said. It’s true. ... But precisely because it is so obviously true, saying it out loud is a threat.”
Among the latest to bail on "Tucker Carlson Tonight" was the personal finance website NerdWallet, which said in a statement to NBC News that it had “pulled its advertising and will be reevaluating any ongoing advertising on this program.”
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A spokeswoman confirmed the company abandoned the show after a monologue Thursday about economics and immigration in which Carlson said the U.S. needs more “scientists and skilled engineers” for increasingly automated and tech-centered jobs.
On Friday, one of the show’s advertisers, Pacific Life Insurance Company, said that it “strongly disagree[d]” with his comments.
“Our customer base and our workforce reflect the diversity of our great nation, something we take great pride in,” the statement said. “We will not be advertising on Mr. Carlson’s show in the coming weeks as we reevaluate our relationship with his program.”
A spokeswoman with SmileDirectClub, which makes teeth straighteners, told NBC News the company is “actively working with our media buyers to confirm that SmileDirectClub is no longer running our ads around any political opinion shows.”
The spokeswoman, Shara Siegel, declined to say if the departure was over Thursday’s show.
The fitness equipment maker Nautilus also bailed on the show, according to a statement obtained by The Hollywood Reporter. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
