Surprise: One of the Murdochs Just Turned Against Trump

James, CEO of the parent company of Fox News, condemns Charlottesville response
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 18, 2017 6:30 AM CDT
Surprise: One of the Murdochs Just Turned Against Trump
A 2014 photo Rupert Murdoch, center, and his sons, Lachlan, left, and James.   (Photo by Dan Steinberg/Invision/AP Images, File)

The latest CEO to turn against President Trump may be the most surprising: It's James Murdoch, head of 21st Century Fox, parent company of the president's favorite news channel. Murdoch also is the son of media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who is not only the acting CEO of Fox News but has become what the Los Angeles Times describes as an informal adviser to Trump. "I can't even believe I have to write this: standing up to Nazis is essential; there are no good Nazis," the younger Murdoch wrote in an email addressed to "friends" obtained by the New York Times. "Or Klansmen, or terrorists. Democrats, Republicans, and others must all agree on this, and it compromises nothing for them to do so."

In the email, James Murdoch explicitly calls out Trump, saying that the violence in Charlottesville "and the reaction to it by the President of the United States concern all of us as Americans and free people." (Read the full text.) He also announced that he and his wife, Kathryn, were donating $1 million to the Anti-Defamation League, and he urged those he was emailing to also make a donation. The Guardian notes that Kathryn on Wednesday tweeted a link to an essay in Politico written by a former speechwriter for George W. Bush urging his fellow Republicans to put aside party loyalty and stand up to Trump. (More Rupert Murdoch stories.)

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