When Fox News host Laura Ingraham taunted a Parkland, Fla., shooting survivor in a Wednesday-morning tweet about his college applications being rejected, Twitter users hit back where it hurt most: among her advertisers.
David Hogg, the 17-year-old high school senior turned gun control activist, mustered the collective power of social media — and his more than 630,000 Twitter followers — and urged them to “tweet away” at her top sponsors to call on them to boycott her TV show, The Ingraham Angle.
Within 24 hours, several companies responded — among them the pet food brand Nutrish and the home goods retailer Wayfair — announcing over Twitter and in media interviews that they would pull their ads from her show.
By Thursday afternoon, Ingraham apologized. “On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland,” she tweeted.
In the era of boycotts as a byproduct of outrage, with figures such as President Donald Trump threatening the NFL over player protests and airline customers employing the tactic to force change, Hogg’s push for Ingraham’s advertisers to respond to her comments worked remarkably quickly.
The swift results showcase the power that the Parkland survivors have, not just in organizing rallies but in spurring corporate America to act. Brands, too, have become quicker to distance themselves from controversy, whether by renouncing white supremacy after neo-Nazis praise their products or by pulling their sponsorship after another Fox News personality, Bill O’Reilly, was accused of sexual harassment.