The insurer which covers American military members and their families pulled its support for the show.
USAA insurance advertising support was withdrawn from Fox News following Sean Hannity’s coverage of Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich’s murder.
Hannity’s reportage introduced his own theory about the case, despite the fact that it conflicted with police reports.
Police investigating the case determined that Rich was murdered as a part of a robbery that went gravely awry. However, Hannity reported his own theory that the murder was deliberate in order to silence the Democrat. Hannity suggested that Rich provided WikiLeaks with confidential emails and was murdered for his actions. This theory had been debunked and Fox retracted it, but Hannity persisted.
The USAA insurance advertising withdrawal was not overtly made in response to the reporting on the murder. However, the decision followed closely on the heels of Hannity’s presentation of his theory and is being broadly linked with USAA’s decision.
The USAA insurance advertising choice was the subject of a recent Tweet to explain the action.
USAA tweeted that “advertising on opinion shows is not in accordance with our policy and we’ve since corrected it.” This post appeared on the insurance company’s official Twitter feed.
That said, the military personnel insurance provider was not alone in taking their advertising dollars away from Fox News. Other large organizations to withdraw their marketing budget funds from the Fox program include: Peloto and Casper, Ring.com, Cars.com, Leesa Mattress, as well as Crowne Plaza Hotels. Each of these companies submitted their decision to Fox on the same day as USAA.
Hannity was not silent about his theories regarding the advertising withdrawal from his show. He blamed the organization for arranging a boycott. May 24, he tweeted on his official Twitter account “Liberal Fascism. Mmfa is targeting my advertisers to silence my voice. They hope to get me fired. Rush, O’Reilly, Beck, Imus, & now me.” Hannity’s position at Fox is considered uncertain by many in the media.
The USAA insurance advertising withdrawal occurred only a month after Allstate withdrew its ads from Fox following accusations of sexual harassment against Bill O’Reilly.
