PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE DISTRIBUTION
JUNE 29, 2015
NHLA APPLAUDS NBCUNIVERSAL’S DECISION TO FIRE DONALD TRUMP AFTER INCENDIARY IMMIGRANT COMMENTS
NBCU Will Terminate Relationship with Trump Following NHLA's Recommendation
Washington, D.C. - The National Hispanic Leadership Agenda (NHLA), a coalition of 39 of the nation's preeminent Latino advocacy organizations, released the following statement applauding NBCUniversal (NBCU) for responding to NHLA’s request to end its business relationship with the annual Miss USA and Miss Universe Pageants. These programs were part of a joint venture between NBCU and Donald Trump. As of today, NBCU will no longer air the pageants and has announced they are cutting off financial ties to Trump.
“Our community and its allies have made it unequivocally clear that calling Mexican immigrants incendiary and racist remarks is unacceptable. The country's 54 million Latinos are not going to tolerate hate speech from anyone, regardless of whether they are a reality television star or a presidential contender. We have put Donald Trump on notice. If he continues to spew poisonous hate speech about Mexican immigrants and by extension, the entire Latino community, there will be consequences,” said Hector Sanchez, Chair of NHLA and Executive Director of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement. “I thank NBCU and Univision networks for standing with Hispanic families and making it clear that they also believe in a diverse and inclusive nation free from hate speech. NHLA now looks to the Republican National Committee, Republican presidential contenders, and other Republican congressional and state leaders asking them to also stand with our community and publicly denounce Trump's hateful comments.”
Felix Sanchez Chairman and Co-founder, National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts, stated, "Last week we confronted hate and the Confederate flag, hate and marriage equality, and today, we confronted hate and the defamation of 54 million U.S. Latinos. Latinos in social media created a groundswell of activism in response to Trump’s bigoted comments. When the media, elected officials, and presidential candidates of both parties failed to respond to Trump, the Latino community galvanized itself online to create their own strong and unequivocal voice."
"Bravo," applauded Alex Nogales, President and CEO, National Hispanic Media Coalition. "It is good to have media partners with a conscience who understand that doing business with people like Trump is not only unconscionable, but also harms relationships with the Latino community and other fair-minded non-Latinos."
Trump, a contender for the Republican presidential nomination, issued inflammatory comments regarding Mexican immigrants as part of his presidential bid announcement. NBCU’s announcements follow that of the entertainment division of Univision Communications, which announced last week that it would no longer air the Miss U.S.A. pageant and terminated its financial ties to Trump. The announcement from NBCU comes after numerous Latino leaders weighed in and more than 200,000 Americans signed a petition imploring the network to cut its ties with Trump.
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Established in 1991, the National Hispanic Leadership Agenda (NHLA) brings together Hispanic leaders to establish policy priorities that address, and raise public awareness of, the major issues affecting the Latino community and the nation as a whole. For more information, please visit www.nationalhispanicleadership.org and follow @NHLAgenda.
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