Fox announced that Nick Cannon will be allowed to keep his job as the host of The Masked Singer.
The network said in a statement to the Washington Examiner late Wednesday night that Cannon, 39, has “sincerely apologized and quickly taken steps to educate himself and make amends” for “inadvertently promot[ing] hate,” which is why they are not firing him unlike ViacomCBS, which terminated their working relationship with him after he made anti-Semitic remarks.
“When we were made aware of Nick Cannon’s interview with Richard Griffin on YouTube, we immediately began a dialogue with Nick,” a spokesperson for the network said. “He is clear and remorseful that his words were wrong and lacked both understanding and context, and inadvertently promoted hate. This was important for us to observe. Nick has sincerely apologized, and quickly taken steps to educate himself and make amends. On that basis and given a belief that this moment calls for dialogue, we will move forward with Nick and help him advance this important conversation, broadly. FOX condemns all forms of hate directed toward any community and we will combat bigotry of any kind.”
Cannon, in a statement, issued “deepest and most sincere apologies” to Jewish people for his commentary during an episode of his YouTube talk show Cannon’s Class, which featured Richard Griffin, also known as Professor Griff from the Public Enemy rap group.
“First and foremost I extend my deepest and most sincere apologies to my Jewish sisters and brothers for the hurtful and divisive words that came out of my mouth during my interview with Richard Griffin,” he said. “They reinforced the worst stereotypes of a proud and magnificent people and I feel ashamed of the uninformed and naïve place that these words came from. The video of this interview has since been removed.”
“While the Jewish experience encompasses more than 5,000 years and there is so much I have yet to learn, I have had at least a minor history lesson over the past few days and to say that it is eye-opening would be a vast understatement,” Cannon added.
Cannon, who claimed in the controversial episode that he couldn’t be anti-Semitic because the real Semites are black, also brought up the Rothchilds — which “is a trigger for the most explosive of anti-Semitic tremors,” according to the Anti-Defamation League.
ViacomCBS fired Cannon from his improv show Wild ‘N Out on Tuesday, accusing him in a statement of failing to apologize or show remorse for the comments.
“While we support ongoing education and dialogue in the fight against bigotry, we are deeply troubled that Nick has failed to acknowledge or apologize for perpetuating anti-Semitism, and we are terminating our relationship with him,” a ViacomCBS representative said. “We are committed to doing better in our response to incidents of anti-Semitism, racism, and bigotry. ViacomCBS will have further announcements on our efforts to combat hate of all kinds.”
