Rush Limbaugh Speech - P 2012
Getty ImagesEven with advertisers running for the hills, Rush Limbaugh is upholding his sponsorship standards.
One day after the controversial “dating” website AshleyMadison.com offered to buy up abandoned advertising space on his radio show, the conservative firebrand has fired back, promising to never align himself or his program with their business. A spokesperson for AshleyMadison.com, which encourages and enables extramarital affairs, had previously stated: “We are in the business of selling affairs, and our audience is absolutely his audience.”
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“We do not [accept] sponsor companies that help people cheat on their spouses,” Limbaugh said on his radio program Thursday. “We have not accepted [their offer]. We have never run ads from [them]. We never will.”
As of Thursday, 49 former advertisers had pulled their sponsorships from the show following Limbaugh’s controversial comments about Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke, leaving five whole minutes of dead air during the broadcast. As THR previously reported, 77 of the 86 ads that aired were unpaid public service announcements.
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“We do not believe Mr. Limbaugh should be penalized for expressing his opinion,” AshleyMadison.com chief executive Noel Biderman told Yahoo News. “Rush has always been a controversial figure and we have always been a controversial service, so we can relate.”
“While I am not surprised that Mr. Limbaugh feels he is above letting us advertise on his show, he is mistaken if he believes that millions of his listeners don’t need AshleyMadison.com,” Biderman later added.
The site, whose motto is “Life is short. Have an affair,” currently advertises on Howard Stern’s Sirius XM radio show.
