Fox News and Tucker Carlson faced additional sponsor defections on Monday, with fitness maker Bowflex announcing that it would cease advertising on Carlson’s primetime program “Tucker Carlson Tonight” after a flap about Carlson’s comments about immigrants last week.
Bowflex’s decision follows similar moves by Pacific Life, the employment website Indeed and SmileDirectClub, which all publicly cut ties to the show.
“We can confirm that Nautilus, Inc., parent company for Bowflex, has pulled its ads from the ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ show,” the company told THR. “We have requested that Fox News remove our ads from airing in conjunction with ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ in the future. Aside from our decision to remove our ads from his show, we have no other association or affiliation with Mr. Carlson.”
Also on Monday, SmileDirectClub announced that it would pull all advertising on politically themed cable news programs.
“We are actively working with our media buyers to confirm that SmileDirectClub is no longer running our ads around any political opinion shows,” the told TheWrap.
Meanwhile, Indeed responded to many Twitter users that not only was the company was out as a Carlson sponsors, but it had dropped the show a month ago. “Hi there, Indeed is not currently advertising on Tucker Carlson Tonight and has no plans to advertise on this program in the future,” read a tweet from the company.
Advertisers for Carlson’s show have come under an enormous pressure campaign by liberal activists after Carlson remarked on his show last Thursday that immigrants’ presence in the United States made the country “poorer and dirtier and more divided.”
On Friday, insurance giant Pacific Life also gave Carlson the boot.
In a statement to TheWrap on Monday, Fox News said it stood by its anchor and would not bow to pressure.
“It is a shame that left-wing advocacy groups, under the guise of being supposed ‘media watchdogs’ weaponize social media against companies in an effort to stifle free speech,” a network rep said. “We continue to stand by and work with our advertisers through these unfortunate and unnecessary distractions.”