Last week, Candace Owens departed The Daily Wire after a high-profile back-and-forth with the outlet’s co-founder, Ben Shapiro. He’s now speaking out about the end of the relationship.
While appearing on The Rubin Report with Dave Rubin, Shapiro agreed with Owens that she’s “free,” from The Daily Wire, he just disagrees with her sentiment that she was somehow muzzled at the company.
“She’s free to do whatever she wants to do, and to be wherever she wants to be,” said Ben Shapiro. “A platform should have a very broad range of speech that it allows, including speech that maybe even the creators don’t believe is inside what they would consider to be the Overton window.
“It’s a very different thing than direct subsidization of particular opinions. So The Daily Wire would not have a host — would not pay a host — who was staunchly pro-abortion, and would have no obligation to pay a host who is staunchly pro-abortion. So when it comes to the hosts on The Daily Wire, obviously, everyone was able to say what they want. Nobody ever comes to me and says, ‘You can’t say x,’ nobody ever says it to (Matt) Walsh and no one ever said that to Candace.”
He continued by noting there was a “non-meeting of the minds” that led to the exit of Candace Owens, but insisted there isn’t an issue with the outlet’s hosts ability to say what they wish.
“There’s no free speech problem with The Daily Wire. And we don’t wish to pay a particular host or that host saying ‘I don’t wish to work here anymore,’ because, again, there’s a parting of the ways that is not really open for discussion at this point.”
Ben Shapiro added that hosts at the outlet don’t have to worry about their jobs simply because they disagree with his opinion on a particular topic. He shared an anecdote that a similar situation recently arose with Matt Walsh.
“I can safely say (the departure of Candace Owens) is not about disagreements over Israel,” he said. “Matt Walsh has taken the position that America ought not be involved in the Middle East at all. Now his position so far, as I understand it, and I’ve talked to him about it, is that in the conflict between Israel and Hamas, Israel is obviously a more moral party than the genocidal terrorist cause, but also it’s very far away. He doesn’t care, and it doesn’t involve America.
“That’s just a pure isolationist position. I disagree with that. I think it’s wrong, and I think that is short-sighted, but again, he’s on our platform that is well within the range of acceptable discourse at the Daily Wire. So the notion that you have to mirror my exact perspectives on what Israel is doing in Gaza is obviously not true based on the roster of hosts that we currently have. There are a lot of other factors obviously at play.”
