Rudolph W. Giuliani was suspended by WABC radio on Friday and his daily talk show was abruptly canceled after the station said he violated its policy by trying to discuss discredited claims about the 2020 presidential election on air.
John Catsimatidis, the billionaire Republican businessman who owns the station, said he had made the decision after Mr. Giuliani refused to avoid the topic despite repeated warnings.
[...]
WABC has become a haven for conservative voices and colorful New York City characters. He broadcast Mr. Giuliani’s show every weekday and featured him on another program on Sundays.
[...]
“Obviously I was never informed on such a policy, and even if there was one, it was violated so often that it couldn’t be taken seriously,” [Giuliani] wrote.
[...]
Mr. Guiliani’s removal from WABC, one of his only current sources of income, is almost certain to add to the mounting legal and financial woes that have engulfed him in the years since.
[...]
Giuliani has been criminally charged in two states, Georgia and Arizona, for this role in the effort to overturn the 2020 results and has been targeted in a number of recent lawsuits. He has also been besieged by creditors, including two Georgia election workers to whom he owes $148 million after a court found that he had defamed them.
[...]
The Times reported last year that Mr. Giuliani earned roughly $400,000 a year from WABC; more recent court filings suggested he was losing money on the endeavor.
[...]
Mr. Catsimatidis appears to have grown increasingly concerned that Mr. Guiliani’s continued presence on air could put WABC in legal jeopardy.
[...]
[A letter from Catsimatidis to Giuliani] cited with concern a Bloomberg Law article reporting that the two George poll workers Mr. Giuliani defamed were accusing him of making new false statements.
[...]
Mr. Catsimatidis said he had his own views about the outcome of the last presidential election, but that, like Mr. Giuliani’s, they were not a subject to discuss on air.
“My view is that nobody really knows but we had made a company policy,” he said. “It’s over, life goes on.”
[...]
By Mr. Catsimatidis’s account, the events that prompted Mr. Giuliani’s suspension escalated on Thursday, as the host railed against the legal cases against him and the suspension of his law license in New York. He was midsentence when employees in the control room cut him off.
NYT
No comments:
Post a Comment