After an innocuous joke about Kamala Harris' wardrobe, a rising conservative star found herself out of a job.
One month after tweeting that Harris' pantsuit at the State of the Union resembled a UPS uniform, Amber Athey revealed Tuesday that she lost her co-hosting gig at WMAL-FM because critics found her comment, which included UPS' retired slogan, racist.
The Daily Mail reports:
‘Kamala looks like a UPS employee — what can brown do for you? Nothing good, apparently,' Athey wrote in the March 1 tweet, referring to an old UPS tagline.
She said there was no sign of any offense being caused by the pithy comment until a few days later.
‘I spoke critically of protests in favor of ‘trans kids' at the University of North Texas. A group of maniacal left-wing activists who want to chemically castrate children in the name of ‘gender affirmation' came after me. All of a sudden, the Kamala tweet was being re-framed as racist and dozens of Twitter accounts were bragging about contacting my employers about my “bigotry,”‘ Athey explained in a column for the publication.
Over the past two weeks, I have received a lot of questions about why I haven't been on @WMALDC.
— Amber Duke (@ambermarieduke) April 4, 2022
I was not sick or on vacation. @WMALDC @CumulusMedia fired me for making a "racist" joke about Kamala Harris's SOTU outfit. https://t.co/kOV9mTLqIA
While Athey's bosses at The Spectator dismissed the campaign to fire her, WMAL did so — allegedly without giving her a chance to defend herself.
The Daily Wire reached out to WMAL for comment following Athey's tweet. The station hasn't responded. However, Athey's former co-host, Larry O'Connor, revealed he petitioned Cumulus Media to reverse its decision.
I have been fighting all month to get @amber_athey back on O'Connor and Company and I will continue to do whatever I can. We assembled a great broadcast team.
— L A R R Y (@LarryOConnor) April 4, 2022
I still have hope that @CumulusMedia will do the right thing. pic.twitter.com/X8POy2hswD
For Athey, the only solution is to keep fighting, as The Daily Wire noted:
“I am sick and tired of conservatives apologizing to the left, staying quiet because they're afraid of burning bridges, or complaining incessantly without taking action,” she wrote at The Spectator. “We will only defeat the left's bad faith attempts at censorship if we fight back.”
I’m confused… When trump was president the mainstream media always had negative stories about the First Lady. Again, double standards, rules for thee and not for them,
The problem with our country is that the wokes are organized and we are not. Conservatives, libertarians and people with common sense and morals should, en masse, boycott the companies who cater to the woke. Cancel your subscriptions and stop buying their products.
organizing a boycott sounds like a good idea. it is becoming ridicules’