Sinclair Needs to Fire Boris Epshteyn

It finally happened: The Sinclair Broadcast Group’s latest “must-run” segment — commentary the company forced local-TV stations to air — was so noxious that even Sinclair is trying to distance itself from it.

The network’s tweet came the day after it aired a segment featuring its chief political analyst and former Trump aide Boris Epshteyn defending the teargassing of asylum seekers — including children — at the U.S. border.

This is far from the first time that Sinclair has pushed Epshteyn’s racist must-run segments.

Epshteyn has produced segments that try to justify the Trump administration’s policy of separating families and detaining children at the border. In another must-run segment, Epshteyn endorsed Trump’s claim that there was violence from “both sides” at the neo-Nazi rally last year in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Sinclair’s practice of forcing stations to air daily “must-run” segments is super-sketchy because the commentaries masquerade as local news. Requiring stations to air this racist rhetoric is one of the ways the network upholds White supremacy and serves as a propaganda machine for the Trump administration.

Justifying the tear-gassing of families and children is another low on a long list of lows.

Enough is enough. Get Boris Epshteyn off the air.