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At least 1 advertiser is re-thinking its relationship with Laura Ingraham following racist comments

The Fox News host used white nationalist language to dismiss reparations for slavery on her podcast.

At least 1 advertiser is re-thinking its relationship with Laura Ingraham following racist comments
Fox News host Laura Ingraham suggested on her podcast this week that reparations for slavery were unnecessary because Native Americans and enslaved Africans had been conquered and needed to get over it. (Photo credit: Michael Brochstein/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

At least one advertiser has told ThinkProgress that it is re-thinking its relationship with Fox News host Laura Ingraham’s program, The Ingraham Angle, after she made racist remarks dismissing reparations for slavery on her podcast this week.

Ingraham went on a tirade against the idea of reparations Thursday, saying it was unnecessary for the government to do anything to repair the still-lingering damage hundreds of years of slavery in the United States caused to the black community.

Her guest at the time, Hate Crime Hoax author Wilfred Reilly, warned that if the nation gave reparations to the descendants of slaves, Native Americans would also demand compensation. Ingraham agreed.

“People would argue that the whole world … has been reshaped by people taking other people’s land,” she responded. “It’s called conquest.”

She then suggested that those who had suffered as a result of slavery needed to get over it.

“As Trump always says, ‘You don’t get do-overs,’” she said. “No do-overs, that’s it. There was an argument sometime — I think it was the 1980s. There was a quote, ‘you won, we lost, that’s that.’ Describing world politics, we won, you lost, that’s that. That’s just the way it is.”

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Critics equated Ingraham’s remarks to white nationalism. Media Matters noted that the comments specifically mirrored those of avowed white supremacist Richard Spencer.

Ingraham responded by saying her comments had been taken out of context, ignoring the fact that an initial report on the exchange from The Daily Beast included the full four and a half minute audio.

Ingraham made several comments in the past that caused advertisers to flee her show. Her remarks last summer comparing immigrant detention facilities to “summer camps” led multiple businesses to end their relationships with the program. After she claimed in August that immigration was changing the country’s demographics for the worse, major brands began pulling their ads once again.

ThinkProgress reviewed commercials from Thursday’s episode of The Ingraham Angle, as well as its late night rerun, and contacted each company that ran ads to see if it planned to continue advertising on the show in light of Ingraham’s most recent comments.

BritBox, a streaming service partnership between BBC and ITV, told ThinkProgress, “We do not condone such views, and we will be following up with our media agency.”

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Though companies can and often do specify where their ads run, a spokesperson for Tecovas, a Western boots company, said in an email: “Rest assured that when we run our commercials, we are only buying ad time and don’t have control over which segments are going to be playing around those time slots. I am very sorry for any misunderstanding here and that our commercial lead you to believe that we were in support of something that we are not.”

ThinkProgress also reached out to:

  • Amazon, producers of the new Late Night movie
  • ASPEN Dental, a dental support organization
  • Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s, outdoor recreation supply vendors
  • Calm, the makers of a meditation app
  • Cambridge Pavers, a paving company
  • Checkers – Rallys, a fast food restaurant chain
  • Creative Planning, an investment management firm
  • Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories, makers of Doan’s pain relief medication
  • Eli Lilly, the pharmaceutical giant that makes Taltz
  • Empire Financial Research, a financial information company
  • EnjoyIllinois.com the Illinois state tourism bureau
  • Fisher Investments, an investment firm
  • Prestige Consumer Healthcare, the makers of Fleet constipation products
  • Kramer Laboratories, makers of Fungi-nail antifungal ointments
  • HD Vision Special Ops, a sunglasses company
  • Knightline Legal, a drug injury law firm
  • Liberator Medical, a catheter supplier
  • LifeLock.com with Norton by Symantec, an identity theft protection service
  • Mentholatum, makers of Rohto Dry Aid eye drops
  • Meyer Law Firm, a personal injury legal firm
  • Novo Nordisk, the pharmaceutical giant and the makers of Ozempic
  • RhinoSystems, the makers of the Naväge nasal irrigation system
  • Roman, a direct-to-consumer online prescription company
  • Sandals and Beaches, the vacation resort chains
  • South Beach Diet, the makers of weight loss products
  • Stamps.com, an online postage company
  • Stanley Steemer, a company that provides carpet and other cleaning
  • Takl, a home services company
  • USAA, an insurance and financial services company
  • Walgreens, the drug store chain advertising its Red Nose Day charitable fundraiser
  • Waterpik, makers of the Sonic-Fushion electric toothbrush
  • WeatherTech, a floor mat and liner company
  • Zona Plus, a blood pressure control device company

The broadcasts also featured spots for the Partnership for Safe Medicines (a corporate coalition opposing drug re-importation), the Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity’s EnjoyIllinois.com (the Illinois state tourism site) and the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (a non-profit organization promoting better relations between the two faiths).

A spokesperson for the Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity told ThinkProgress in an email that “Illinois has long been a bastion of progressivism and does not support all the views or comments of on-air hosts or newscasters featured on our advertising mediums.”

The other two did not immediately respond to inquiries about their advertisements.

In March, two other Fox News hosts faced public opprobrium and lost advertisers because of bigoted comments they made. Jeanine Pirro, host of Justice with Judge Jeanine, told viewers that Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) was a disloyal American because “think about it: Omar wears a hijab.” Fox News issued a statement saying it “strongly condemn[ed]” what Pirro said, and several advertisers told ThinkProgress that they would stop placing ads on her show.

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Tucker Carlson, host of Tucker Carlson Tonight, lost several advertisers after ThinkProgress asked the companies if they condoned Carlson’s comments about statutory rape and the mental abilities of Iraqi citizens. Carlson doubled down, defending his comments, made over a decade ago on the Bubba the Love Sponge syndicated radio program.

Last year, Ingraham took an extended “Easter break” after several advertisers bolted her show over comments she made mocking Parkland mass shooting survivor David Hogg for being rejected from several universities. (Hogg has since stated that he will be attending Harvard University in the fall.)

The network claimed that vacation was pre-planned and Ingraham eventually offered an apology.