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(NEWSWEEK)
Over the past few months, Fox News hosts have repeatedly opposed “vaccine passports”—special privileges given to vaccinated individuals—as an anti-American threat to personal freedoms. Its hosts have also opposed mask mandates as unnecessary and even a form of “child abuse.”
The network’s most popular host, Tucker Carlson, has claimed that the vaccines are deadlier than the government will admit. Carlson has also said that asking people whether they’re vaccinated is a “super vulgar personal question.” He compared it to asking people about their HIV status or their favorite sexual positions.
A July 16 study from the media watchdog group Media Matters found that 60 percent of Fox News’ vaccination segments from June 28 through July 11 pushed “anti-vaccine propaganda.”
The study tallied each time any speaker either said that vaccines were unnecessary or dangerous. It also tallied whenever a speaker said that immunization efforts represented a coercive form of government overreach or a violation of personal freedoms.
Now, Fox News has required its employees to upload their vaccination statuses into a company database. While the network’s hosts and guests have promoted vaccines in the past, they have also pushed doubts about the vaccines’ safety.
The media outlet required all in-person and work-from-home employees to upload their vaccination status to a system called “Workday” by August 17, according to an internal memo recently published by AdWeek.
Fox News doesn’t require its employees to be vaccinated. However, it still required them to provide vaccination information for contact tracing and space planning purposes to follow guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as well as state and city health authorities, the memo said.
Fox News is requiring its employees to upload their COVID-19 employee vaccination statuses even though its hosts have casted doubts on vaccines’ efficacy. In this photo, traffic on Sixth Avenue passes by advertisements featuring Fox News personalities, including Bret Baier, Martha MacCallum, Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham, and Sean Hannity, adorn the front of the News Corporation building, March 13, 2019 in New York City.
From as early as June, Fox News informed employees that vaccinated individuals who upload their status to the system could get a “FOX Clearpass.” The pass allows employees to work without a mask or social distancing. All unvaccinated individuals must do both. Unvaccinated workers must also conduct a “WorkCare Daily Screen” to reduce the possibility of a COVID-19 outbreak.
Though the outlet has promoted vaccines, its employee vaccination disclosure policy and Clearpass both contrast with its broadcasts that have sowed doubts about vaccines’ safety and railed against “vaccine passports.”
