© 2024 WYSO
Our Community. Our Nation. Our World.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Al Sharpton's Unlikely Rise To MSNBC Host

The Rev. Al Sharpton is the host of MSNBC's <em>PoliticsNation</em>.
Stephen J Boitano
/
AP
The Rev. Al Sharpton is the host of MSNBC's PoliticsNation.

The newest opinion host on cable news channel MSNBC is the Rev. Al Sharpton, a figure much better known for a past in which he cast more heat than light.

F. Scott Fitzgerald notwithstanding, Sharpton is now on at least his third act in public life: as a civil rights activist with a history of divisive and confrontational tactics; an increasingly accepted player in Democratic Party politics; and now, cable news pundit and host of PoliticsNation, which airs weeknights at 6.

Sharpton says he wants his show to offer a hearing for racial justice and the plight of the working and middle class on TV.

"You can do that with a bullhorn on the corner at Washington Square Park, but that's not going to compete with a Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity or a Bill O'Reilly," Sharpton says. "You can't bring mid-20th-century techniques to a 21st-century fight and expect that you're going to win."

Sitting at an empty desk in his starkly bare office at MSNBC — he had just moved in the day before — Sharpton scrolls through his Blackberry to catch up with a crush of email. He says he thought MSNBC President Phil Griffin was joking when he offered him the gig.

But Sharpton says he wanted the TV job badly because of how conservatives have been dominating cable television and talk radio.

"They've been able with that domination to push a certain kind of political thought that I think is contrary to a lot of the things that I have fought for — and continue to fight for — all my life," he says.

Sharpton has repeatedly — and unsuccessfully — run for public office as a Democrat. But in recent years, he has increasingly found politicians eager for his public support.

The announcement of his new show sparked criticism from conservatives, but some black journalists also voiced reservations, asking why a black news professional was not selected for the job. That controversy quickly faded, but viewers may not be able to get beyond his record so easily.

The Al Sharpton Of Old

A generation ago, Sharpton sported a James Brown bouffant hairdo, brightly colored tracksuits and a medallion around his neck. More significantly, he repeatedly struck an inflammatory tone amidst moments of racial tension. At a press conference in 1988, for example, Sharpton publicly defied a special prosecutor on behalf of a black teenager who had accused a group of six white men of raping her

"As far as your subpoena's concerned, you can take it and shove it up in the garbage pail," Sharpton said, tearing papers before the cameras for maximum effect.

A grand jury investigation subsequently found no evidence the young woman, Tawana Brawley, had been raped at all. One of the accused, a prosecutor who was exonerated, ultimately left his job and later partially blamed the charges for the collapse of his marriage. That attorney, Steven A. Pagones, sued Sharpton for defamation of character — and Sharpton lost.

Sharpton says he simply disagreed with the grand jury investigating Brawley's case, just as a friend of his disagrees with the verdict in the O.J. Simpson murder trial.

Still, Sharpton says, he has few regrets.

"Maybe some of the theatrics could have been handled different — but the basic point of me standing up behind someone I believed, why would I?" Sharpton asks. "If I regret that, then I would have to regret any case that the jury didn't find to be true."

Last month the former firebrand wrote a conciliatory piece in the New York Daily News about his fractious role in the aftermath of the Crown Heights riots. It was a modest recognition, at most, that his public declarations had exacerbated tensions between blacks and Orthodox Jews.

He's 'All The Things That ... MSNBC Is'

I tell MSNBC President Phil Griffin that a lot of people have asked me what he was thinking by hiring Sharpton.

"I get that from time to time as well," Griffin says.

Sharpton has calmed down, slimmed down, adopted business suits, dropped the medallions and become an influential figure in Democratic circles. Hillary Clinton sought his counsel when first running for a U.S. Senate seat in New York in 2000. President Obama courted him as a candidate and again as recently as this past spring.

Griffin says that stature is what made Sharpton attractive as he cast about for a replacement for Cenk Uygur's short-lived show. Sharpton had served as a guest host for Ed Schultz's nightly program on MSNBC earlier this year. (He also filled in some years ago for Chris Matthews on Hardball.)

"I'm a big fan of Rev. Sharpton; I've known him quite a bit," Griffin says. "He's smart. He's entertaining. He's experienced. He's thoughtful. He's provocative — [he's] all the things that I think MSNBC is."

In recent years, MSNBC has registered some of its best ratings by banking sharply to the left in its evening programming and building a model that owes more to the traditions of talk radio than broadcast television. Sharpton has already become a part of that programming as a frequent guest who is favored for his colorful and unapologetic style.

Now, as the new host of PoliticsNation, he's focusing on the task at hand. Sharpton is not yet silky smooth on the air — at times, he evokes Ron Burgundy more than Tom Brokaw. But as Sharpton is quick to note, he's a talker, not an anchor — and his trademark one-liners are starting to resurface.

Griffin points proudly to Sharpton's recent taunting of Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry's statements deriding Social Security as a "Ponzi scheme." Sharpton said Democrats should "put out bumper stickers saying, 'It's not about Obama — it's about your Momma' — and we'll win."

Both Sharpton and Griffin reject the idea that the new host was being rewarded for supporting cable giant Comcast's takeover of NBC Universal from General Electric. Sharpton's National Action Network signed a compact with Comcast to promote diversity in its programming and initiatives. The National Urban League and NAACP were also partners in the agreement and have subsequently supported Sharpton's presence as a host.

According to Griffin, Sharpton is now sparking and guiding debate, rather than stoking controversy.

"Obviously, 20 years ago, Rev. Al was a different guy. And I'm not sure that guy either would have wanted — or we would have wanted — to give him a show," Griffin says. "But he's evolved. And he's taken on a different persona over the last decade. He wants to do something different and reach people in a different kind of way."

Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

David Folkenflik was described by Geraldo Rivera of Fox News as "a really weak-kneed, backstabbing, sweaty-palmed reporter." Others have been kinder. The Columbia Journalism Review, for example, once gave him a "laurel" for reporting that immediately led the U.S. military to institute safety measures for journalists in Baghdad.