Jesse Watters: ‘Unpatriotic’ Women’s Soccer Team is Hurting Pay Gap Case By ‘Disparaging’ Trump

Fox News host Jesse Watters said the U.S. women’s soccer team isn’t helping their case for equal pay by “disparaging” President Donald Trump.

In the wake of their decisive victory at this year’s world cup, the U.S. women’s team has called for equal pay, and even filed a class action lawsuit against the U.S. Soccer Federation alleging they are paid less than the men’s team.

On The Five, Watters countered that the women’s team is paid less because the women’s world cup generates less revenue than the men’s. He then mounted another argument: that the women’s team is hurting its case with “behavior” he deemed “unpatriotic.”

“The point is that women are not helping their case by their behavior,” Watters said. “If you go out and you disparage the president, you act in unpatriotic ways and then complain about not getting paid equally, well, what you think is going to happen? People will not watch.”

Watters claimed that he spoke to “many, many people” who “love soccer” but refused to watch the U.S. women’s team because players had criticized the president.

“That means the ad revenue comes down and overall revenue comes down and they can’t divvy up the same amount of money,” Watters explained.

While the women’s world cup certainly doesn’t garner the same worldwide audience as the men’s, his claim that Americans tuned out of the women’s tournament because of Trump criticism doesn’t make much sense: the final match between the U.S. and the Netherlands was one of the highest rated soccer telecasts in American history, per CNN, besting the men’s 2018 tournament by 20%.

The women’s team came under fire by Trump last week after a clip went viral showing captain Megan Rapinoe saying she would not go to the White House.

Watch above, via Fox News.

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