Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo interviewed an animal rights activist posing as the CEO of a pork manufacturer.
The six-minute interview, which aired on Wednesday, was promoted as one with Dennis Organ, the CEO of Smithfield Foods Inc., on providing vaccines for food workers after there was a coronavirus outbreak at one of the company’s plants. But, Bartiromo was actually interviewing Matt Johnson of Direct Action Everywhere, a grassroots animal rights organization.
Johnson remained in character for the entirety of the interview while making some strident claims about the industry.
“The truth is that our industry, in addition to the outbreaks that are happening at our plants, our industry poses a serious threat in effectively bringing on the next pandemic, with CDC data showing that three of four infectious diseases come from animals and the conditions inside of our of farms can sometimes be Petri dishes for new diseases,” he said.
Bartiromo issued a correction at the end of her show.
“We have an important correction to make,” she said. “It appears we have been punked. Earlier in the program, I interviewed someone claiming to be the CEO of Smithfield Foods, Dennis Organ. We’ve since learned that that was not Dennis Organ but an imposter making false claims about the company. He is someone who has absolutely no relation to Smithfield Foods. We want to apologize to Dennis Organ, Smithfield Foods, and to our audience for making this mistake. We will, of course, be more vigilant.”
Smithfield CAO Keira Lombardo issued a statement saying, “FOX Business aired a segment that was a complete hoax,” adding that a “simple Google search” for a photo would have prevented the debacle, according to the Washington Post.
