Media personalities who faced consequences for problematic remarks, from Terry Moran to Don Lemon

Fox News

21 hours ago

ABC News dismissed veteran correspondent Terry Moran on Tuesday for violating network policies with an opinionated social media post, but he was hardly the first journalist to land in hot water over controversial rhetoric.
While Moran's controversial comments came on X, other pundits have been suspended or worse for problematic on-air comments. News personalities have been scolded for everything from insensitive comments about women to shocking remarks about the Holocaust.
Here are some of the more high-profile examples in recent memory:
The longtime ABC News correspondent was let go Tuesday over his now-deleted X post attacking President Donald Trump and top White House aide Stephen Miller.
Moran, who had been with the network for 28 years, was shown the door just before his contract with the network was set to expire on Friday. He was initially suspended after ABC News executives woke up to the viral backlash that he caused by offering personal thoughts on Miller and Trump, who he interviewed in the Oval Office in April.
"The thing about Stephen Miller is not that he is the brains behind Trumpism," Moran began his post. "Yes, he is one of the people who conceptualizes the impulses of the Trumpist movement and translates them into policy. But that's not what's interesting about Miller. It's not brains. It's bile."
"Miller is a man who is richly endowed with the capacity for hatred. He's a world-class hater," Moran wrote. "You can see this just by looking at him because you can see that his hatreds are his spiritual nourishment. He eats his hate."
Moran also went on to call Trump a "world-class hater" in the post but added that "his hatred [is] only a means to an end, and that end [is] his own glorification. That's his spiritual nourishment."
An ABC News insider told Fox News Digital that Moran was well-liked internally but the Disney-owned network was left with "no alternative" but to terminate him.
The former NBC News reporter repeatedly and openly criticized Elon Musk and his handling of Twitter, raising questions about whether Collins could report impartially on the topic before he was temporarily banned from covering the billionaire in 2022.
Collins, who covered "disinformation, extremism and the internet for NBC News," did not try to hide his left-wing political leanings, often firing off liberal missives on social media while a reporter.
During his time at NBC, Collins regularly disparaged Musk's takeover of Twitter, now known as X. Collins once tweeted that Musk "is now learning the hard way what information researchers have known for decades: Everybody's pro-free speech. No s--t. Also, when you run a for-profit company, you will meet your line eventually."
Collins once snarked, "Elon, have you ever considered that maybe people just disagree with you and you've been living in a particularly well-sealed bubble of money-chasing Yes Men until very recently?"
Collins left NBC News and is now CEO of The Onion. In an interview last month with Vanity Fair, Collins said he was suspended for "being too mean to Elon Musk."
"After that, I realized my time on this peacock is short. When I saw The Onion was for sale, I realized that maybe I didn't have to live my entire life in this doldrumescent hell. I started chasing this thing, and we really did save it from what we would now call AI death. Or the throes of a decabillionaire who is worried about white genocide," he said.
CNN fired Don Lemon in 2023 after the anchor caused constant headaches for network executives with his rhetoric.
Lemon found himself in hot water two months before he was shown the door by saying Nikki Haley was past her "prime" at age 51, citing Google as his source while stunning his female co-anchors in the process. Lemon offered a mea culpa during the network's editorial call the next day, but female colleagues weren't pleased.
Colleagues were further enraged when Lemon was spotted at Miami Beach after the insensitive remarks about Haley. Lemon was then ordered to take "formal training," but his time at the network was already coming to an end.
Lemon's "prime" comments were universally panned and not just by conservatives, receiving mockery from Biden spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre during a White House briefing and even making its way to this year's Oscars ceremony. Best Actress winner Michelle Yeoh told women in Hollywood, "Don't let anybody tell you, you are ever past your prime."
Those remarks were hardly the first time Lemon's on-air rhetoric sparked backlash among female viewers.
In 2014, he infamously asked a Bill Cosby accuser why she didn't simply bite his penis to prevent an alleged rape. In 2022, he asked CNN analyst S.E. Cupp if she was suffering from "mommy brain" after she lost her train of thought during a panel discussion. Later that year, Lemon clashed with his female "CNN This Morning" co-hosts while arguing that male athletes make more money than women because "people are more interested in the men."
During his time at CNN, Lemon also compared Trump supporters to Ku Klux Klan members, defended Antifa, and fumed over people unvaccinated against coronavirus "taking up the space" in hospitals, among other news-making moments.
Whoopi Goldberg was suspended in 2022 for controversial remarks about the Holocaust on ABC News' "The View."
Goldberg, who differs from others because she is a talk show host as opposed to a true journalist, went viral when she argued that the Holocaust "isn't about race," stunning her colleagues at the table.
"What is it about?" co-host Joy Behar asked.
"It's about man's inhumanity to man, that's what it's about," Goldberg said.
"But it's about a White supremacist going after Jews and Gypsies," guest co-host Ana Navarro said as Goldberg attempted to speak over her.
"But these are two White groups of people," Goldberg said as her colleagues disagreed.
Jewish groups condemned the comments, accusing Goldberg of minimizing Jewish suffering. She attempted to explain her remarks during her appearance on "The Late Show," suggesting she never meant to offend anyone.
"I think of race as being something that I can see," Goldberg told Stephen Colbert.
"You couldn't tell who was Jewish. They had to delve deeply to figure it out… My point is, they had to do the work," she continued. "I don't want to fake apologize… I'm very upset that people misunderstood what I was saying."
ABC News suspended Goldberg for two weeks, saying she needed to take time to "reflect and learn about the impact of her comments."
Behar also faced significant backlash for 2018 comments that mocked then-Vice President Mike Pence's Christian faith.
"The View" panel first criticized Pence's faith when co-host Sunny Hostin said, "I don't know that I want my vice president, um — speaking in tongues and having Jesus speak to him."
Behar chimed in, adding that hearing from Jesus is actually called "mental illness." She eventually apologized.
British journalist Martin Bashir left MSNBC in 2013 after sparking widespread controversy for suggesting that someone should defecate in former Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's mouth. While he apologized the following week, the damage was done.
Bashir initially took off two weeks for what was billed as a vacation, and MSNBC took heat for failing to act against him. He left the network upon his return after a meeting with then-MSNBC president Phil Griffin.
"I have tendered my resignation. It is my sincere hope that all of my colleagues, at this special network, will be allowed to focus on the issues that matter without the distraction of myself or my ill-judged comments," Bashir said. "I deeply regret what was said, will endeavor to work hard at making constructive contributions in the future and will always have a deep appreciation for our viewers – who are the smartest, most compassionate and discerning of all television audiences."