BuzzFeed pulls out of $1.3 million advertising deal with RNC over Donald Trump

BuzzFeed has pulled out of advertising agreement with the Republican National Committee over objections to Donald Trump's rhetoric. The buy was for $1.3 million, apparently. The main consideration was the site’s employees – that BuzzFeed could not countenance “having employees make ads, or working at the company and having our site promoting things, that limit our freedom and make it harder for them to live their lives.” Asked if the site would rule out any Trump advertising, the source said the specifics would matter: “In general, we have taken the position that we won’t take ads for his presidential campaign.”

In an e-mail to staff, BuzzFeed founder and CEO Jonah Peretti explained that in April, the RNC and BuzzFeed signed an agreement to "spend a significant amount on political advertisements slated to run during the Fall election cycle." But since Trump became the nominee his campaign has proven themselves to be "directly opposed to the freedoms of our employees in the United States," because of proposed bans on Muslim immigration and comments about descendants of immigrants, among other policies. "We don't need to and do not expect to agree with the positions or values of all our advertisers. And as you know, there is a wall between our business and editorial operations. This decision to cancel this ad buy will have no influence on our continuing coverage of the campaign," Peretti said in the memo.