Jemele Hill’s Comment sparks uproar with ESPN and the White House
ESPN has found themselves in yet another racial and political battle.
After Colin Kaepernick’s combat over ESPN and free speech, Jemele Hill, a sports commentator on ESPN’s ‘SportsCenter6’ has put herself in a similar situation.
ESPN made strides to take Hill off the air for one night after her comments calling Donald Trump “a white supremacist who has largely surrounded himself with other white supremacist.”
She also called Donald Trump a “bigot” and went on to criticize his supporters, saying “The height of white privilege is being able to ignore his white supremacy, because it’s of no threat to you. Well, it’s a threat to me.”
Although Hill’s tweets were her thoughts and completely unrelated to ESPN period, others feel like her position as a host represents the whole ESPN organization. ESPN released a statement saying Hill's comments "do not represent the position of ESPN" and that the network had addressed the remarks with Hill.
Co-host, Michael Smith refused to do the show without Jemele Hill. It is said that ESPN then appointed two other black host, Michael Eaves and Elle Duncan who also turned down the offer as fill-ins for the show.
Hill later tweeted, “My comments on Twitter expressed my personal beliefs. My regret is that my comments and the public way I made them painted ESPN in an unfair light. My respect for the company and my colleagues remains unconditional.”
Kaepernick, who is still unsigned to a NFL team this season, showed his support for Hill on twitter saying, “we are with you @jemelehill.”
White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said that ESPN should consider firing Hill for her twitter comment.
“I think it’s one of the more outrageous comments that anyone could make and certainly something I think is a fireable offense by ESPN,” Sanders said.
The White House has not said anything regarding Sander’s message, but Donald Trump did take it to twitter to say, "ESPN is paying a really big price for its politics (and bad programming). People are dumping it in RECORD numbers. Apologize for the untruth!"