MSNBC host Al Sharpton, under scrutiny over conflicts of interest for taking cash from the Kamala Harris campaign, has emerged unscathed from the liberal network’s recent cancellation spree.
On Saturday, MSNBC canceled host Joy Reid’s primetime show, The ReidOut. The bloodbath continued on Monday after the network canceled the weekend shows of Ayman Mohyeldin, Katie Phang, and Jonathan Capehart. Those three hosts will remain employed by the network in different roles, while Reid is leaving after her final show airs on Monday.
Sharpton’s weekend show, PoliticsNation, remains untouched, raising questions about how the anti-Semitic activist survived the bloodbath. President Donald Trump raised the issue on Sunday, asking whether Sharpton has leverage over Brian Roberts, the president of Comcast, which controls MSNBC.
"Then there’s, of course, the LOW IQ Con Man, Al Sharpton, who has, perhaps, the lowest TV ratings in the history of television," said Trump. "What is he doing to Brian Roberts to stay on the air?"
MSNBC has long faced scrutiny for employing Sharpton, because of his controversial history and concerns that he uses threats of boycotts to pressure companies to give him money. In 2015, black media mogul Byron Allen sued Comcast and Sharpton in 2015, alleging that Comcast paid $3.8 million to Sharpton’s charity, the National Action Network, to endorse the company’s purchase of NBCUniversal. Months after he publicly championed the deal, MSNBC hired Sharpton to host PoliticsNation.
Sharpton’s National Action Network has created more recent ethics concerns for MSNBC. Journalists and media ethics groups have criticized Sharpton and MSNBC following the Washington Free Beacon’s report that Sharpton’s National Action Network nonprofit received $500,000 from the Kamala Harris campaign just before he interviewed the Democratic candidate on his MSNBC show.
The Society of Professional Journalists said the conflict of interest created a "black eye" for Sharpton, MSNBC, and the journalism industry.
Sharpton has also used his MSNBC perch to promote boycotts against companies he deems to be insufficiently pro-black. Sharpton announced last month that he will select two companies to target in a boycott led by the National Action Network.
An Ohio chapter of the National Action Network has already called for a 24-hour boycott later this week of companies that ended DEI initiatives. Moniquec Conner, the president of the National Action Network chapter in Canton, Ohio, announced the boycott against McDonald’s, Walmart, and Amazon in what will be the "first of multiple counter measures to the attack on DEI."
MSNBC did not respond to a request for comment.