Ad execs encourage X CEO Linda Yaccarino to quit after Elon Musk’s antisemitic embrace

New York –

A “groundswell” of promoting executives have urged X chief govt Linda Yaccarino to resign from her position on the embattled social media firm within the wake of an advertiser exodus and scrutiny over proprietor Elon Musk’s antisemitic remarks on the platform, in line with advertising business veteran Lou Paskalis.

“I sent her a text yesterday after thinking about it long and hard saying that,” Paskalis, the founder and chief govt of promoting consultancy AJL Advisory, advised CNN on Monday, including that different members of the business had carried out the identical. “My advice was to leave before her reputation was damaged.”

Yaccarino, a former NBCUniversal govt, joined the corporate previously generally known as Twitter earlier this yr to assist revive its promoting business. Hundreds of main manufacturers paused their advert spend after Musk’s acquisition over considerations about content material moderation and the platform’s future beneath the eccentric billionaire.

But no less than a half dozen main advertisers, together with media giants Disney, Paramount and NBCUniversal, halted their spending on X on Friday. IBM additionally suspended promoting on the platform after its advert appeared alongside pro-Nazi content material. The choices to drop the platform adopted criticism of Musk over his public embrace of an antisemitic conspiracy idea favoured by White supremacists.

“She thinks quitting is failing … She believes that she can mother Elon Musk into someone who could be respected by the advertising community, and that ship has definitely sailed,” Paskalis mentioned. “But she’s not going to come off the mechanical bull without all of us telling her, ‘It’s time to go.’ And I believe that there has been a groundswell of a lot of people such as myself saying, ‘save yourself.’”

Yaccarino has indicated that, for now, she’s not going anyplace.

“I believe deeply in our vision, our team, and our community,” she posted Monday morning on the platform. “I’m also deeply committed to the truth and there is no other team on earth working as hard as the teams at X.”

In a letter to staff despatched Sunday evening, which was considered by CNN, Yaccarino additionally reaffirmed her dedication to the corporate’s work.

“Our work is critical, but it’s not always easy,” she mentioned. “What we’re doing matters, which means it naturally invites criticism from those who do not share our beliefs.”

Yaccarino has additionally mentioned that X has taken steps to “combat antisemitism and discrimination,” as she advised staff within the Sunday letter. The firm over the weekend accused Media Matters — the progressive media watchdog that first reported that advertisements for IBM and different main manufacturers have been working alongside pro-Nazi content material — of aggressively looking for such content material in a method that “misrepresented the real user experience” and will “mislead advertisers.” (Media Matters has pushed again on this assertion.)

However, X didn’t take away the pro-Nazi accounts talked about in Media Matters’ report, as an alternative saying that their posts had little engagement and that they might not be eligible for monetization.

“No critic will ever deter us from our mission to protect free speech,” Yaccarino mentioned within the Sunday letter.