Megyn Kelly lashed out at NBC for its decision to bow to pressure from network stars and fire former Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel just days after it was learned she had been hired as a paid contributor.
“The children at Dem-SNBC are mad,” Kelly said during Tuesday’s episode of her SiriusXM podcast “The Megyn Kelly Show,” addressing the controversy over McDaniel’s hiring due to her longstanding support for former President Donald Trump.
Kelly mocked the uproar that was kicked up by the likes of MSNBC stars Rachel Maddow, “Morning Joe” Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski and Jen Psaki as well as by network talent including Chuck Todd.
“Our sacred airwaves! They must be protected from liars!” Kelly sarcastically said on Tuesday, taking aim at the Peacock Network.
“After all, they are in the business of honesty!”
Kelly slammed Psaki, the former White House press secretary under President Biden who was hired as an MSNBC host despite having an overtly political job beforehand.
“Hey, you had no problem hiring Jen Psaki, who lied for a living for years as an Obama and then Biden spokesperson, so … what gives?” Kelly said, adding that Psaki reminded her of Dora the Explorer, the main character from the Nickelodeon animated series.
Psaki on Monday blasted critics who compared her to McDaniel, who, along with dozens of others, were fired from their jobs at the RNC after the Trump campaign carried out a massive overhaul.
The former Biden aide said that “some in the right-wing ecosystem” were pushing the comparison, which was out of place since her experience in politics was “paired with honesty, and with good faith,” whereas McDaniel was devoted to “service to one man.”
Kelly called out Psaki on Tuesday for “the lie about how the vast majority of illegal immigrants do not intend to stay here.”
She also cited Psaki’s comments as press secretary when she said that “no one anticipated that the Taliban would take over Afghanistan as quickly as they did” as well as her efforts to dismiss the Hunter Biden laptop as Russian disinformation.
The Post has sought comment from NBC.
NBC News stars criticized the decision to hire McDaniel due to her ties to Trump, the former president who has said he was the rightful winner of the 2020 election that brought Biden to power.
McDaniel gave an interview to “Meet the Press” on Sunday distancing herself from those claims, saying that Biden won the election “fair and square” and that he was the “legitimate” president.
Maddow, MSNBC’s most popular personality, compared it to putting a mobster to work in a district attorney’s office.
“I find the decision to put her on the payroll inexplicable and I hope they will reconsider that decision,” she said on her weekly program Monday night.
Other MSNBC stars including Joy Reid, Nicolle Wallace and Lawrence O’Donnell also blasted the move publicly.
Republicans countered that the protest indicates that people at NBC News, particularly at MSNBC, were unwilling to countenance opposing viewpoints. The hiring, and quick firing, represent one of those rare instances likely to unite the left and right — in anger.
“NBC caving in to the censors,” Elon Musk, owner of X, formerly Twitter, posted on his platform.
On his Truth Social site, Trump said, “These Radical Left Lunatics are CRAZY, and the top people at NBC ARE WEAK.”
In announcing the decision to fire McDaniel, NBC Universal News Group chairman Cesar Conde apologized to staff members who felt let down by the hire, acknowledging he had signed off on it.
“No organization, particularly a newsroom, can succeed unless it is cohesive and aligned. Over the last few days, it has become clear that this appointment undermines that goal,” Conde wrote in a memo on Tuesday.
But he said the network remained committed to centering “voices that represent different parts of the political spectrum.”
There was no immediate comment from McDaniel, who stepped down as RNC leader just over two weeks ago.
She found out she lost her job through media reports, not from NBC directly, said a person close to her who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about it publicly.
With Post wires
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