Why can’t Fox apologize? It won’t back down even amid Pirro, Carlson controversies

By Paul Farhi and Sarah Ellison
March 11 at 5:30 PM

Fox News has no regrets and no remorse. It isn’t sorry.

Faced with yet another uproar — actually, two of them within 24 hours — the cable network has blandly, mildly offered . . . well, very little in response. No apologies, no promises of reform, no retreat, no surrender.

The nonresponse appears almost to be a strategy, a resistance in the face of controversy that has helped Fox define itself as a different, defiantly polarizing brand. Its double-down approach seems parallel to that of President Trump, whose political career has been boosted for years by Fox.

The latest Fox uproar involves prime-time host Tucker Carlson, whose vulgar comments about women, girls and a polygamous cult leader on a syndicated radio program more than a decade ago spurred outrage when they were released Sunday by Media Matters for America, a liberal watchdog group and longtime Fox nemesis.

In response, Carlson issued a brief statement dismissing any controversy; he allowed that his comments were “naughty” and invited critics to come on his program to debate him — an attempt to turn lemons into Nielsen ratings.

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