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Sunday, Mar 24, 2013 1:48 PM UTC

Tea Partyers boycott Fox News for being too “left”

A three-day boycott of the network protested a lack of coverage of the attacks on Benghazi, among other things

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Topics: Tea Party, Fox News, 2012 Elections, Roger Ailes, Benghazi attack,

Tea Partyers boycott Fox News for being too (Credit: spirit of america / Shutterstock.com)

A group of Tea Partyers organized a three-day boycott of Fox News in protest of its coverage of Benghazi, tepid opposition immigration reform, and in general “turning to the left” since the election.

David Freedlander of the Daily Beast reports:

The three-day boycott lasted Thursday morning through Sunday morning, and is the second time this group of activists have gone Fox-free in an effort to steer the coverage. Organizers say a two-day boycott earlier this month knocked 20 percent off of the network’s regular viewership. (A Daily Beast analysis of the same data showed that the boycott had little effect.)

A spokeswoman for Fox News did not respond to a request for comment.

A leader of the boycott, Kathy Amidon, of Nashville, declined an interview, instead directing The Daily Beast to a website, Benghazi-Truth. The website, a single-page, 23,000-word manifesto complete with multicolored fonts, supposedly incriminating videos of Fox News’s complicity in a coverup, and communist propaganda photographs, is kept by someone who identifies himself online as “Proe Graphique,” and who other members of boycott described as someone who works “in New York media.”

“Particularly after the election, Fox keeps turning to the left,” Stan Hjerlied, one of the boycotters, told the Beast. “So we are really losing our only conservative network.”

“The more I research into Fox—I saw that they donate more to Democratic candidates than conservative or Republican candidates—I was like holy cow! Maybe they are just trying to snatch our pockets. Maybe they are just talking the talk, because it sure doesn’t look like they are walking the walk,” said another boycotter, Donnie Farner.

Jillian Rayfield is an Assistant News Editor for Salon, focusing on politics. Follow her on Twitter at @jillrayfield or email her at jrayfield@salon.com. More Jillian Rayfield.

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