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A Florida congressman blasted NBC on Saturday after the network declined to run an ad naming several major U.S. companies sponsoring the 2022 Beijing Olympics that the representative has labeled the “Genocide Games.”
“The world’s greatest athletic showcase, but just outside the show: rape, genocide, slave labor,” Rep. Mike Waltz (R-FL) said in the 30-second ad. “American companies are drunk on Chinese dollars, entangled with communist dictators committing atrocities and propping up these genocide games staged by the Chinese Communist Party.”
Enes Kanter Freedom, outspoken human rights advocate and Boston Celtics center, was also featured in the advertisement critical of the Chinese Communist regime.
“Stand for freedom, defund the dictators,” Kanter said. “When you see ‘Made in China…’”
“…Put it down,” Waltz said.
Waltz posted the advertisement on social media and explained that NBC would not run the ad in it’s current form.
“NBC refused to air my Olympics ad with @EnesFreedom unless we censor U.S. corporate logos of the Genocide Games sponsors,” Waltz tweeted on Saturday. “We won’t let them silence us.
NBC refused to air my Olympics ad with @EnesFreedom unless we censor U.S. corporate logos of the Genocide Games sponsors.
We won’t let them silence us.
Here’s the ad that NBC and the Chinese Communist Party doesn’t want you to see 👇 pic.twitter.com/0y35Z6KdZC
— Rep. Mike Waltz (@michaelgwaltz) February 5, 2022
The ad includes the logo for several top sponsors listed by the International Olympics Committee including Visa, Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola, Airbnb and Intel. Nike who is providing apparel for Team USA is also cited in the ad.
Waltz noted the grave nature of the crimes committed by communist China, drawing a comparison to two tragic genocides of the 20th century.
“This is the equivalent of holding the Olympics in Germany in the 1940s or Rwanda during their atrocities,” Waltz told the New York Post. “It is beyond the pale that the [International Olympic Committee] didn’t move the games.”
“I think the companies supporting it should be absolutely ashamed,” the Florida lawmaker said. “Many of them preach social justice and contribute millions of dollars to social justice causes and yet are turning a blind eye to the genocide going on. Many of them are complicit with their own supply chains.”
A spokesman for Waltz noted that the ad would have to be changed to remove the logos of the companies before the network would accept it.
“NBC will not run our ad unless we remove the corporate logos of companies,” James Hewitt, a spokesman for Waltz said, also noting that the ad will not be altered.
A network spokesman clarified that the ad was not rejected outright, but that they required changes in accordance with their advertising guidelines before they would run it.
“The ad was not rejected. Per NBCUniversal’s long-standing advertising guidelines, changes to the ad were requested so it could air,” a network spokesman said.
“It defeats a major purpose of the ad: to highlight US sponsors’ culpability with China’s human rights abuses,” Hewitt explained. “The point of the ad was to target Olympic audiences in DC.”
Some people weren’t swayed by the ad that slammed the atrocities taking place in China because it was too inconvenient to protest so many American companies at once and other claimed it could have posed harm to the U.S. athletes currently in China.
That’s a lot of American companies you are protesting at once. What’s your plan? Also, might want to learn what a dictatorship actually means..
— Cnote (@CnotedChicago) February 5, 2022
Your ad would have endangered our athletes.
— cece (@ccmtweeting) February 6, 2022
Others on social media were more sympathetic to Waltz’s plea but find it difficult to not buy things made in China.
the really aggravating thing is when you need something, don’t want to buy ‘made in china’ and there are no alternatives. some stuff online doesn’t tell you where its made!
— Wild Horse Fantasy (@starhorsepax) February 5, 2022
Hopefully when you guys take office next January you move to take on corporations that suppress our Freedom of Speech. @NBCNews has no right to alter any ad they feel will hurt them but it true. Our media outlets & tech outlets are out of control.
— Raiderfanatic (@jcoastbklyn) February 5, 2022
It feels like everything and everything is a lie today. I am near 60 yrs old and I have never felt the kind of anti freedom pressure we face today. I hope we all stand up like the Canadian Truckers for the sake of future generations.
— gray (@graydonb) February 6, 2022
These games are reminiscent of the 1936 Berlin Olympics… Both held in repressive totalitarian regimes that exploit and brutalize ethnic minorities… Hitler had Jews, Xi has Uyghurs.
— Darrell Schrage (@DarrellSchrage) February 6, 2022
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