Fox News host Rachel Campos-Duffy boasted on Sunday morning she and co-host Pete Hegseth are unvaccinated, despite the fact that the network’s parent company requires that all New York City employees provide proof of vaccination to work in person.
The declaration on Sunday morning, which on the surface seems to place both on-air personalities in violation of both corporate and city policy, came as they tried to push back on President Joe Biden’s joke about the network’s vaccine hypocrisy.
During the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday night, the president garnered perhaps his biggest laughs of the evening when he took a swipe at the conservative network, pointing out that to attend the event everyone had to prove they had their COVID-19 shots.
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“Everyone had to prove they are fully vaccinated and boosted,” he quipped. “So, if you are at home watching this, and you are wondering how to do that, just contact your favorite Fox News reporter, they’re all here, vaccinated and boosted, all of them.”
While the president was clear that he was talking about just the Fox News stars in attendance at the dinner, he was also clearly taking a shot at the loudly anti-vax mandate positions taken by many of the network’s hosts and commentators.
On Sunday morning, Campos-Duffy wanted to remind the president that despite the network’s parent company Fox Corp. recently bragging that over 90 percent of its workforce has been vaccinated, not all Fox News employees have gotten the jab.
“They tried to make a big deal. The event said you had to be vaccinated in order to attend,” she declared on Fox & Friends Weekend. “I know, because I was invited and I didn’t go for many reasons, but that was one of them.”
The morning co-host added: “They tried to call out Fox News and say ‘Look! Fox News is all vaccinated!’ No, that’s not true!”
Pointing to Hegseth, who was seated on the couch next to her, she noted that both of them are “not vaccinated.” She went on to say that “we allow people choice” and, therefore, she found Biden’s joke to be “so ironic.” (Again, the president was merely talking about the Fox News staff in attendance at the dinner.)
The irony, however, appears to lay in the fact that Fox Corp. announced in December that all of the company’s New York City employees would need to be compliant with the city’s mandate that all in-office workers provide proof of vaccination by the end of that month.
“All workers in NYC who perform in-person work at an office location, including Fox employees, must show proof of receiving at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine,” the company’s memo read.
The memo also stated that Fox staffers would not be able to submit a negative COVID-19 test in order to skip the vaccination requirement. The company already had put in place stringent vaccine protocols for all of its in-office employees, requiring them to either provide vaccination status or submit to daily coronavirus testing.
As of now, New York City still has in place its workplace vaccination requirements. “Workers in New York City who perform in-person work or interact with the public in the course of business must show proof that they have received a COVID-19 vaccine,” the guideline states. “Businesses may not allow any unvaccinated workers to work at their workplace.”
At the same time, New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced in late March that he was rolling back the city’s vaccine requirements for all city-based athletes and entertainers. (Visiting players and performers had already been exempt.) It’s possible that this may be the loophole that these Fox News hosts are using to avoid the city’s worker mandate.
Additionally, the city does carve out exceptions for those asking for “reasonable accommodations for medical or religious reasons,” adding that “businesses must record the basis for the accommodation and keep supporting documentation in accordance with the below guidance.”
A Fox News spokesperson told The Daily Beast that the network has previously said it is fully compliant with New York City’s COVID-19 policies.
Campos-Duffy and Hegseth, both loud critics of the COVID-19 vaccines, have previously noted on-air that they are not vaccinated. In November, weeks before the company announced its New York City policy, Campos-Duffy boasted on air that she and Hegseth had not received any shots.
Furthermore, back in February, Mediaite ran a piece wondering how Hegseth was hosting in-studio at Fox News’ New York City location despite seemingly admitting he was unvaccinated. At the time, Fox News declined to comment on how the host appeared to circumvent the company’s own policies, citing confidentially of private employee health matters.
