After Laura Ingraham mocked Stoneman Douglas shooting survivor David Hogg (for not being accepted by every college to which he applied), her show lost over a dozen advertisers, and she announced a vacation. Such a move didn’t bode well for Bill O’Reilly, who was fired days after he announced his own vacation amid a sponsor exodus. However, Fox News appears to be standing behind Ingraham amid speculation that she’s on more of an impromptu hiatus than a vacation, and the cable news network has issued a statement.
Deadline has published the clarifying words from Fox News Co-President Jack Abernethy, who insists that they’re backing Ingraham against attempts at censorship, and nothing is amiss because she’s on a real vacation:
“We cannot and will not allow voices to be censored by agenda-driven intimidation efforts. We look forward to having Laura Ingraham back hosting her program next Monday when she returns from spring vacation with her children.”
Well, it is spring break for many school children, so there’s a fair chance that Ingraham embarked upon a legitimately pre-planned vacation. In addition, it’s also important to point out that while she cruelly mocked a teenager on Twitter, Ingraham isn’t embroiled in a massive scandal (like O’Reilly was) involving millions of settlement dollars paid to sexual harassment accusers.
To that effect, CNN’s Brian Stelter, who acknowledged Ingraham’s apology to Hogg on Twitter, discussed the matter on Sunday’s edition of Reliable Sources. Stelter declared that he was “wary” of the boycott against Ingraham, and he believes that it’s “dangerous to see these ad boycott attempts happening more and more often in this country.” Whether or not this boycott has an effect on Ingraham’s show for the long haul remains to be seen, but it sounds like she’ll be back to test those waters soon enough.