MSNBC Allegedly ‘Unaware’ of $500K Donation to Al Sharpton’s Group by Kamala Harris Campaign

The cable news network MSNBC has stated that it was “unaware” of a $500,000 donation made to Al Sharpton’s organization by the failed presidential campaign of Kamala Harris, ahead of a friendly interview between Sharpton and Harris.

As Fox News reports, FEC filings confirmed that the Harris campaign made two separate payments of $250,000 to Sharpton’s nonprofit National Action Network in September and October. Sharpton then interviewed her on his MSNBC show “PoliticsNation” on October 20th, where he asked mostly softball and friendly questions, but failed to inform his viewers of the conflict of interest.

“Today is your birthday, and we all reflect on our birthdays, what our life would mean,” Sharpton said to Harris in the interview. “You called me on my birthday. Thanks again. What do you want, 50 years from now, history to say about Kamala Harris?”

“Some little girl or little boy is gonna be talking about you like you talked about Ms. Shirley Chisholm,” Sharpton chimed in later, referencing the first black woman ever elected to Congress, who herself ran a failed campaign for president in 1972.

“MSNBC was unaware of the donations made to the National Action Network,” an MSNBC spokesman said in a statement following the report, which was first made by the Washington Free Beacon. The Beacon noted that Sharpton did not even inform the MSNBC “network brass” about the donation.

This latest report appears to confirm a trend of the Harris campaign making large payments to friendly journalists ahead of interviews with the candidate. The campaign had donated $2.5 million to Oprah Winfrey’s network ahead of her interview with Harris. Another $350,000 was paid to Nu Vision Media, a media company run by left-wing journalist Roland Martin; the payment was made on September 9th, and Roland interviewed Harris in October.

Despite her artificial attempts at increasing her prominence in mainstream media interviews, Harris failed to connect with voters and lost the 2024 election in a landslide to former President Donald Trump.