The Parkland high-school shooting survivor and March for Our Lives leader David Hogg has been accepted into University of California, Irvine, according to TMZ, weeks after he was ridiculed by Fox News host Laura Ingraham over his college rejections.
Ingraham was forced to apologize last month after she tweeted: “David Hogg Rejected By Four Colleges To Which He Applied and whines about it,” causing scores of advertisers to boycott her show, The Ingraham Angle.
It was previously and erroneously reported that Hogg, 17, had been rejected from UC Irvine because his mom had said he'd been turned down when he just hadn't heard back from the prestigious school. TMZ said Hogg got an acceptance letter from the school last week that said: “Students choose UCI to make a true difference in the world, we hope you will too.”
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Hogg helped lead the March for Our Lives rally that drew nearly 800,000 people to Washington, D.C. to advocate for gun-control measures following the mass shooting at his school that killed 17 people.
Ingraham shared a news report from the Daily Wire stating Hogg had been rejected from four UC schools, including Irvine, and said his rejection was "totally predictable given acceptance rates."
After Ingraham's mocking tweet, Hogg shared a list of companies which advertised on Ingraham's show and encouraged people to get in touch to complain about her comments. Nineteen companies including TripAdvisor, Nestle and Hulu all removed their backing from Ingraham's show.
A day after her original tweet, Ingraham apologized, saying: "Any student should be proud of a 4.2 GPA —incl. @DavidHogg111. On reflection, in the spirit of Holy Week, I apologize for any upset or hurt my tweet caused him or any of the brave victims of Parkland. For the record, I believe my show was the first to feature David immediately after that horrific shooting and even noted how "poised" he was given the tragedy. As always, he’s welcome to return to the show anytime for a productive discussion."
Ingraham later announced she was taking a break from her show for a week over Easter, though Fox News insisted the break was planned before the anger and upset caused by her comments. She's expected to return to her show Monday after the cooling-off period.
Fox News maintained its support for the host during the criticism, with co-president Jack Abernethy saying: "We cannot and will not allow voices to be censored by agenda-driven intimidation efforts. We look forward to having Laura Ingraham back hosting her program [Monday] when she returns from spring vacation with her children."
Ingraham was also backed by comedian Bill Maher.
Hogg is one of the 20 founding members of Never Again MSD—a group of survivors from the deadly shooting who are aiming to significantly influence the gun control debate ahead of the 2018 midterms. He was one of the students featured on Time magazine with the headline: "Enough."
He also delivered one of the most powerful speeches at the March for Our Lives rally in Washington DC on March 24 where he declared: 'The winter is over. Change is here. The sun shines on a new day and the day is ours."
U.S. News and World Report ranked UC Irvine ninth among public universities and 42nd among universities nationally.
The activist spoke about his disappointment when he was rejected from the other schools, saying: "It's been kind of annoying having to deal with that and everything else that's been going on but at this point, you know, we're changing the world. We're too busy."
Read it at TMZ
