Carlson comments may turn off advertisers

NEW YORK — This week’s controversy over statements made by Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson is as much about a high-stakes battle over the network’s financial future as it is over what he said on a radio show a decade ago.

The liberal advocacy group Media Matters for America this week released two batches of recordings Carlson made as a guest on radio’s “Bubba the Love Sponge Show” between 2006 and 2011, before he worked at Fox. The release was timed to coincide with Fox’s meeting with advertisers on Wednesday, the first time it has ever made a sales pitch that for most television networks is a rite of spring.

In the tapes, Carlson made remarks minimizing statutory rape, used sexist slurs to refer to specific women, referred to Iraq as “a crappy place filled with a bunch of, you know, semiliterate primitive monkeys” and made sexually suggestive comments about a 16-year-old contestant in the Miss Teen USA pageant.

Fox’s prime-time host has responded by attacking Media Matters and vowing that “we will never bow to the mob.” Carlson said “it’s pointless to try to explain how the words were spoken in jest, or taken out of context, or in any case bear no resemblance to what you actually think.”

What’s behind the words is a bare-knuckles brawl over advertising revenue. Media Matters’ goal has been to publicize controversial or offensive things said by Fox’s prime-time hosts Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham to grab the attention of advertisers. The strategy worked before for liberal activists when Fox News parted ways with Glenn Beck.

Fox routinely has the biggest audience of any cable TV network, but its controversies have tarnished the brand, said Mark Hughes, CEO of C3, a firm that consults with companies on ad strategies. The troubles date to sexualmisconduct allegations against Carlson’s predecessor, Bill O’reilly, and the late Fox chief Roger Ailes.