The biggest story of ESPN's work week started with a tweet in which SportsCenter (The Six) host Jemele Hill labeled President Trump a white supremacist on Monday, and came full circle on Friday morning, September 15, when the President took to Twitter to finally addressed the firestorm over Hill's comment directly.
"ESPN is paying a really big price for its politics (and bad programming). People are dumping it in RECORD numbers. Apologize for untruth!" wrote Trump.
It was only a matter of time before the sports news network and its vocal anchor heard it from the media-savvy Commander-In-Chief. Earlier in the week press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, spoke on the President's behalf when during her daily presser she called Hill's comment "one of the most outrageous comments that anybody could make" before dubbing it a "fireable offense." Up until Friday's tweet, however, Trump had refrained from responding to the accusation.
Hill has been under fire from the President's supporters, as has ESPN, which issued a statement two days after her remarks came to light, in which the network claimed to have reprimanded her, but ultimately accepted her an apology she made before executives. Many of Trump's supporters perceived the statement to be a slap on the wrist and have since vowed to cut the channel off. But according to a report published by ThinkProgress.org on Thursday, ESPN may not have initially had such generous intentions for how it would deal with Hill. The publication revealed the accounts of sources that say the network was about to replace Hill in the 6 p.m. slot, but faced resistance from some of her Black colleagues, including Michael Eaves, Elle Duncan, and Hill's partner on television Michael Smith, who is said to have refused to go on the air if Hill wouldn't be on the air with him.
Source: nydailynews.com
