A columnist who came under fire last year for a Twitter tirade against a Republican National Committee staffer on Wednesday forced MSNBC to apologize for her insinuation that country music is virulently anti-Muslim.
The slur came during a "Now w/Alex Wagner" segment about Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz's remarks to
"CBS This Morning" that he started listening to country music after the 9/11 terror attacks because he wasn't happy with how rock musicians reacted.
The explanation by Cruz, who has become the first candidate to announce an official campaign for president in 2016, prompted
derision from liberal media outlets.
MSNBC guest Jamilah Lemieux opened a panel conversation on the comments with a blunt declaration that "nothing says 'let's go kill some Muslims' like country music, fresh from Lynchburg, Virginia. Someone who obviously does not want to be a polarizing candidate, he wants to bring people together, I mean – really? That's absurd."
Co-panelists Joan Walsh and Michael Steele could be heard laughing at Lemieux's snide observation, but host Ari Melber cautioned: "Well, I mean, there's plenty of country music that doesn't have that message, right?"
reports Mediaite, which posted a video of the exchange.
Twenty minutes later, Melber read a statement apologizing for the remark, the
Daily Caller reports.
"We have a programming note," Melber said, the Daily Caller reports. "A few minutes ago on this show, a guest made a comment about country music. That comment was not appropriate, and we want to be clear this network does not condone it."
In March 2014,
Ebony magazine issued an apology after Lemieux, then a senior editor for the magazine, got involved in a testy exchange with black RNC staffer Raffi Williams, mistakenly calling him "a white dude" and describing conservatives as "roaches."
"As the magazine of record for the African-American community, Lemieux's tweets in question do not represent our journalistic standard, tradition or practice of celebrating diverse black thought," the magazine said of Lemieux's online spat, which began with her criticism of plans for a new publication for black conservatives.
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