OAN is effectively broke, so much so that earlier this year anchor Dan Ball started carrying a pistol around the MAGA propaganda network’s San Diego headquarters after a vagrant wandered into the building without being stopped by security – since there is none, the Daily Beast reports.
“It can be kind of scary at the studio on the early morning shift when you are pretty much the only person there,” an employee told the Beast. “Especially on weekends when you are basically alone.”
Owner Robert Herring and his sons have become incredibly cheap bastards since DirecTV dropped OAN from the lineup, giving employees gift cards in lieu of bonuses, usually $15 to $25, but sometimes $0 as at least two formers staffers said they got empty Shell gift cards. One time they gave out Target gift cards despite the network being all in on boycotting the “woke” big box retailer.
Employees were furious when the Herrings still tried to offer Tucker Carlson tens of millions to join the team earlier this year – especially Ball, who thinks of himself as much better at the game than Tucker. “He was sitting in his office with glass walls pacing up and down, he was so mad,” one staffer told the Beast about the “star” anchor’s reaction. “Go print your lies, like you always do… You are just a lying POS propagandist for the left. Oh, and go fuck yourself. Print that,” Ball wrote in an email to the Daily Beast’s “fucking hack” Justin Baragona when reached for comment on the matter.