James Talarico has opened up the controversy over his interview with Stephen Colbert at the Late Show.
According to The Hill, the Democratic Texas Senate candidate on Tuesday, February 17, slammed CBS and US President Donald Trump for pulling his interview.
Before casting a vote in the Democratic primary election, Talarico told media, “I don’t think it did anything to assuage the concerns that they were pressured by the most powerful man in the country to change their broadcast. And that should be alarming to all of us, whether we’re Democrats, Independents or Republicans.”
The candidate for the Texas senate was not the only one who criticised the network and Trump administration for the blackout, as the talk-show host also delivered a fiery monologue on Monday, accusing CBS’ attorneys of stopping him from interviewing Talarico.
Colbert told the crowd, “You know who is not one of my guests tonight? That’s Texas State Representative James Talarico. He was supposed to be here, but we were told in no uncertain terms by our network’s lawyers, who called us directly, that we could not have him on the broadcast.”
He also said that the lawyers have asked him not to “mention me having him on” during the live broadcast.
Colbert also accused the White House of trying to “silence anyone who says anything bad about Trump on TV.”
Meanwhile, CBS, in a statement to The Hill, denied all the allegations regarding prohibiting The Late Show from broadcasting the interview.
CBS said that the lawyers only warned that airing the conversation with Talarico could trigger the Federal Communications Commission’s equal time rule for two other candidates.
