Mike Huckabee: NPR was Wrong to Fire Juan Williams

Veteran journalist Juan Williams was fired by National Public Radio (NPR) on Wednesday after saying on Mondays Bill OReilly Show that he was nervous on an airplane when he saw passengers in traditional Muslim apparel. On Thursday, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who moved to Florida earlier in the year, called for Congress to review NPRs budget.

NPR has fired Juan Williams as a result of comments he recently made on the Bill O'Reilly show, said Huckabee, who ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008 and may do so again in 2012. The comments were his personal admission that while he is certainly not a bigot, he said he was nervous when someone in Muslim garb and spouting Muslim doctrine got on an airplane on which he was a passenger. I know Juan and am proud to be a colleague of his as a fellow Fox News contributor. There isn't a more honest and fair-minded person in journalism. He is refreshingly honest and candid and unusually objective when it comes to analyzing the events in the news.

NPR has discredited itself as a forum for free speech and a protection of the First Amendment rights of all, and has solidified itself as the purveyor of politically correct pabulum and protector of views that lean left, added Huckabee. While I have often enjoyed appearing on NPR programs and have been treated fairly and objectively, I will no longer accept interview requests from NPR as long as they are going to practice a form of censorship, and since NPR is funded with public funds, it is a form of censorship. It is time for the taxpayers to start making cuts to federal spending, and I encourage the new Congress to start with NPR.