BBC reverses decision on editorial breach in racism comments

LONDON – The BBC has reversed a decision finding one of its presenters in breach of editorial guidelines for comments critical of U.S. President Donald Trump.

The decision comes after protests supporting anchor Naga Munchetty, who was discussing Trump’s remark that four female American lawmakers should return to the “broken and crime infested places from which they came.”

Co-presenter Dan Walker asked Munchetty’s opinion on a July 17 program, and she responded: “Every time I have been told, as a woman of colour, to go back to where I came from, that was embedded in racism.”

She later added that she was “absolutely furious a man in that position thinks it’s OK to skirt the lines by using language like that.”

The BBC’s Executive Complaints Unit found she had gone too far. But the BBC’s director-general, Tony Hall, overturned the decision Monday.