Jemele Hill Blames Racism And 'De-Blackification' For Career Failures

Seven years later, Jemele Hill is still complaining about ESPN cutting her and canceling "SC6," the reimagined 6 pm "SportsCenter" program she hosted with Michael Smith from 2017 to 2018.

In an interview with Rick Strom, Hill blamed – wait for it – racism for her failures. 

Specifically, Hill blamed former ESPN executive Norby Williamson for trying to "de-blackify" the network. "He did a lot to de-Blackify the show," Hill said. "It just seemed very intentional and purposeful that he wanted to make SportsCenter great again."

Is that so?

Hill then claimed neither she nor her show was ever political. 

"If there was some political or social issue, it definitely was tied to sports and it definitely was in the news," Hill added. "This is something that a lot of black people know, which is your presence is just political. Whether you want it to be or not. So really, what they were trying to say was, ‘where’d they get these two black people from and why are they on the 6 o’clock SportsCenter?'"

Well, that's just not true.

Williamson and the ESPN viewers didn't view Hill as "political" because she is black. They viewed her as "political" because, during the early stages of "SC6," she called President Trump a "white supremacist."

Moreover, ESPN didn't suspend Hill for slurring the sitting U.S. president and turning half the country against the network. ESPN suspended her a month later when she called for fans to boycott NFL advertisers after Cowboys owner Jerry Jones told players they would be benched if they didn't stand up during the national anthem.

The suspension was not political or racial. The NFL is ESPN's most important league partner, and here was an on-air ESPN employee encouraging the fans to drain the NFL's bottom line.

INGLEWOOD, CALIFORNIA - OCTOBER 21: Journalist Jemele Hill attends her book release party at 1010 Wine and Events on October 21, 2022 in Inglewood, California. (Photo by Robin L Marshall/Getty Images)

Finally, Williamson and ESPN didn't cancel "SC6" in an effort to "de-blackify" the channel. Put simply, ESPN canceled Hill's program because it set record lows in the prominent 6 pm time slot. Speaking of advertisers, ESPN lost sponsors because of how poor Hill's ratings were.

In fact, the time slot saw an immediate 20% viewership bump when it replaced Hill with Sage Steele. ESPN confirmed those numbers publicly.

Jemele Hill continues to blame Williamson, fellow ESPN executive Dave Roberts, Trump, racism, politics, and OutKick/Barstool for her lack of success. In reality, she is the one to blame. 

She wasn't a good "SportsCenter" anchor. She chose to severely limit her brand by cosplaying a proud anti-white racist (she is not like this in real life). 

Hill was bad for business. Heck, she is still bad for business. Since ESPN cut her in 2018, she has hosted a podcast for Spotify, a show on ViceTV, and released a memoir. All three ventures failed badly.

The only element of racism at play in Hill's career is that frightened white male executives continue to pay her millions of dollars,  despite her lack of audience. 

Hill now hosts a program on TruTV (the ratings are so low they don't register on the daily top 100) where she recently called white men the "worst thing in America."

Seriously, what a loathsome person she has become.