SPLC Joins Campaign Calling on Dobbs’ Advertisers to Dump Him

In July, as you might recall, the SPLC called on the president of CNN to remove Lou Dobbs from the air after he repeatedly used his platform to nurture the totally discredited “birther” movement. The birthers, of course, are the folks who insist that President Obama was really born in Kenya – not Hawaii – and therefore is not eligible to be president. Their attacks are part of a wider, racially tinged campaign to de-legitimize Obama’s presidency by portraying him as some kind of foreign-born, Marxist, fascist, Muslim friend of terrorists.

As Dobbs continued to obsess over Obama’s birth certificate, CNN president Jonathan Klein decreed that the bogus controversy was indeed settled – in Obama’s favor – and that Dobbs would no longer talk about it on CNN. But Klein took no action to stop Dobbs’ further descent into loony land. Klein, in fact, stood firmly behind Dobbs’ authority to set his own agenda and exercise his own editorial judgment.

Well, now it’s time to revoke Dobbs’ journalistic license altogether. He can no longer lay any claim whatsoever to journalistic objectivity or integrity. This week, he’s headlining an anti-immigrant talk radio fest sponsored by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), which has been designated a hate group by the SPLC.

Dobbs is one of 47 right-wing talk radio hosts who are broadcasting from Washington today and tomorrow to discuss immigration policy as part of FAIR’s “Hold Their Feet to the Fire” anti-immigration rally.

The avuncular CNN host has a long history of stirring up hate against Latino immigrants by reporting wildly inaccurate information and sneeringly focusing on the immigration issue day after day on CNN.

Now, by actively promoting the hate group FAIR and its efforts to demonize immigrants, he’s further damaging CNN’s credibility and making a mockery of the network’s tagline, “The Most Trusted Name in News.”

It’s clear that CNN executives care more about raking in advertiser dollars from Dobbs’ fear-mongering and falsehoods than they do about exercising sound editorial judgment.

That’s why today we are joining a coalition of groups calling for advertisers to stop supporting his show.

To read more about Dobbs’ history of false reporting and to add your voice, go to www.DropDobbs.com.