IHOP said today that it would stop advertising on the Fox News Tucker Carlson show, joining a series of companies in pulling ads after the host’s remark last week about immigrants making America “dirtier.”
“At our core, we stand for welcoming folks from all backgrounds and beliefs into our restaurants and continually evaluate ad placements to ensure they align with our values. In this case, we will no longer be advertising on this show,” a spokesperson for IHOP said.
Carlson has lost advertisers after saying on the air last week that allowing certain immigrants into the United States “makes our own country poorer and dirtier and more divided.”
By Tuesday, 11 companies — including Land Rover and TD Ameritrade — said they would stop advertising on his prime-time show, “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”
Carlson made the comments at the start of his Thursday program, during which he discussed the arrival of Central American immigrants in Tijuana, Mexico.
In those opening remarks, he mocked those who believe “we have a moral obligation to accept the world’s poor.”
Carlson suggested last week that immigrants are making the United States “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,” he said, before criticizing immigrants with his take on the Emma Lazarus 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.”
The first company to pull the plug was Pacific Life.
Others include:
- Ancestry.com
- Bowflex
- Just for Men
- IHOP
- Indeed
- Land Rover
- Minted
- Nerd Wallet
- Pacific Life
- ScotteVest
- SmileDirectClub
- TD Ameritrade
- United Explorer credit card
- Voya Financial
- Zenni Optical
Some companies, including Mitsubishi, Farmers Insurance and John Deere, have said they will not pull their ads from the show, and a Fox News spokesperson said today the yanked ads would be placed elsewhere within the network, meaning no revenue would be lost.
“We cannot and will not allow voices like Tucker Carlson to be censored by agenda-driven intimidation efforts,” Fox News wrote in a statement, blaming left-leaning advocacy groups for pressuring advertisers. “While we do not advocate boycotts, these same groups never target other broadcasters and operate under a grossly hypocritical double standard given their intolerance to all opposing points of view.”
Carlson on his show Monday called the backlash part of a liberal effort to silence him.
“We’re not intimidated,” he said. “We plan to try to say what’s true until the last day.”
Carlson is not the first Fox News host to face an advertiser backlash.
In March, a group of companies pulled their ads from Laura Ingraham’s show after she taunted a survivor of the high school shooting in Parkland, Fla. She subsequently apologized.
Last year, more than 50 brands stopped advertising on “The O’Reilly Factor” after The New York Times reported on settlements that its host, Bill O’Reilly, had made with women who had accused him of sexual harassment or other inappropriate behavior.
That contributed to his ouster; Carlson now holds down O’Reilly’s old time slot.
Just over a year ago, several brands said they would stop advertising on the show hosted by Sean Hannity, the highest-rated Fox News host, after comments he made about Roy Moore, who was then Alabama’s Republican candidate for Senate.
The companies later backed away from those statements, and “Hannity” was relatively unaffected.
