White House Demands Fox News Apologize For Jesse Watters Saying He’s ‘Had It’ with Arab-Americans
The White House on Thursday demanded Fox News apologize for host Jesse Watters’s declaration that “we’ve had it” with “Arab Americans” and “the Muslim world.”
Watters made the controversial remarks during Wednesday’s episode of The Five, which is the top-rated show on all of cable news.
“I want to say something about Arab Americans and about the Muslim world,” Watters said, adding:
We – and when I say we, I mean, the West and Western technology – have created the Middle East. We made them rich. We got that oil out of the ground. Our military protects all of these oil shipments flying around the world, making them rich. We fund their military. We respect their kings. We kill their terrorists, ok? But we’ve had it. We’ve had it with them.
Obama, Trump, now Biden, have tried to get the heck out of that stupid desert. Just as we’re about to get out, because we have this great balance of power we’re arranging, these crazy Muslim fanatics come in and massacre over a thousand of our allies and hold Jewish people hostage, hold Americans hostage. And so, if you are an Arab American in this country and you ripped down posters of Jewish hostages, American hostages, no! No, no, no. Someone is gonna get punched in the face. When you rip down posters of the hostages like that — this is — absolutely not.
In a statement emailed to Mediaite, White House Deputy Press Secretary Andrew Bates responded to Watters: “These hateful lies about ‘Arab Americans and…the Muslim world’ highlight the urgency of President Biden’s work to ensure hate has no safe harbor in America, and why he committed to the first national anti-Islamophobia strategy in our history.”
“These unacceptable remarks come just weeks after the heartbreaking killing of a 6-year-old Palestinian-American child, and during a spike in threats against Muslim and Arab Americans. Fox News owes an apology to every single viewer for this sickening attack on the rights and dignity of their fellow Americans. President Biden will always stand up against Islamophobia, antisemitism, and all forms of hate. Fox News should learn from his example,” Bates concluded.
The White House on Wednesday announced it was working on a national strategy to combat Islamophobia amid rising tensions from the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, which began with the brutal Hamas attack on October 7th that killed some 1,500 Israelis.
Bates also slammed Fox Digital’s coverage of the announcement, which initially included questioning whether or not the Biden administration had a plan to combat anti-Semitism, which is also skyrocketing in the U.S. amid the war. The article later appeared to edit out the question.
“Could not make this up,” Bates wrote as quotes from a Wednesday article which read, “Fox Digital asked the White House…if there would be a national strategy to combat antisemitism.”
Bates then noted Fox News in May covered the announcement that the “White House unveils first-ever national strategy to combat antisemitism.”
