TalkTV host Piers Morgan lashed out at critics of his £1,000 bet with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak that the government would fail to initiate deportation flights before the General Election
Morgan placed the wager before Sunak during an exclusive Piers Morgan Uncensored interview which aired on Monday, which produced backlash, first of all, against the prime minister but then against the host himself.
On Tuesday morning Morgan defended the gamble as a “win-win” and argued that if Sunak lost, which the host said would happen, then the money would go to a refugee charity.
The rest of the morning, the veteran journalist humorously responded to commentary from those in the media like Sky News deputy political editor Sam Coates but replied more pointedly to the more aggressive responses of former other commentators and former politicians.
Former Tory leader William Hague joked that in the same situation he’d “bat [Morgan’s] hand away]” and said that it “would be really nice to do a Judo move” on the journalist. The TalkTV host drafted up a news headline in response.
Sub-tweeting criticism from LBC host James O’Brien, who called Morgan a “publicity-seeking opportunist” and the bet a “disgusting stunt”. The journalist shot back that the commentator was an “insufferable little turd” and accused him of having platformed a “fantasist paedophile”, presumably talking about the appearance of Carl Beech on O’Brien’s show, who made numerous lurid sexual abuse claims about public
figures.
O’Brien pushed back on an allegation by Morgan.
Most significantly, though, Morgan locked horns with New Labour spin doctor Alastair Campbell, who slammed the bet as “vile” in a post on X and described the shock of audiences at his book event to whom he relayed the incident. Morgan shot back with a quip about Campbell’s involvement in drumming up support for the Iraq war when working for the Blair administration.
Campbell hit back, defending his political past, and saying the bet would be the subject of an episode of his podcast The Rest Is Politics.
The political and ethical questions surrounding the bet have remained at the forefront of national conversation as opposition figures, like shadow cabinet ministers Jonathan Ashworth and Stephen Kinnock, arguing that such a wager is insensitive and indicative of Sunak’s detachment from the pressing economic hardships faced by ordinary Britons.
Morgan announced during the afternoon that he plans to address the controversy on Tuesday night’s episode of his TalkTV show Piers Morgan Uncensored.
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