Cumulus gave all staff until Sept. 27 to get their second dose, otherwise you’d be terminated on Oct 11. Cumulus has about 400 stations across North America. Everybody who didn’t post a vaccine card on their “Work Day,” portal by Sept. 27 was fired including Marc Strauss of WJBC, a Cumulus station.
“This was basically all done by email, from the HR people at the big company that is based on Atlanta. We were not given the option of testing out like teachers. It was either get the shot or you’re gone. Hundreds of people on Oct 11 we’re terminated and I was one of them,” said Strauss, who has been with WJBC for near 5 years.
Strauss said the employees of Cumulus were offered the opportunity to put in for a religious or medical exemption.
“A colleague of mine who’s still there, put in for a religious exemption and it was denied,” said Strauss. “I don’t know if anybody who put in for an exemption and had it granted. He also went to his doctor for a medical exemption and his doctor wouldn’t give it to him. We’re hearing a lot of stories about doctors. I think they’ve been pressured. Some of them would lose their license granting a medical exemption. I don’t know of anybody, personally, that has received a medical or religious exemption.”
Strauss said Cumulus was playing real hard line with the mandate.
But why would Cumulus mandate the vaccine so harshly?
Strauss said it could be the funding squeezed into the trillion-dollar “infrastructure bill” that alloted $2 billion for local media.
“I’m wondering if there wasn’t some sort of financial reward. Remember, the industry went through a really rough time. It’s still going through it. Last year, when a lot of us had to work from home and advertisers pulled their investments from a lot of stations,” said Strauss. “I just wonder, behind the curtain if there’s not the promise of ‘hey if you do what we (the government) want, here’s something to get you through this rough time’. There’s no reason for taxpayers to be subsidizing privately owned radio, television, media. That sort of thing. We already spend a lot of money on NPR and public broadcasting and things like that. Now all of a sudden there’s money in this bill and a lot of it.”
The reason why Strauss refused the vaccination was due to some heart issues.
“We’re all seeing more and more stories. I considered it for a while. I wanted to look into it. I think a lot of people felt pressured, because this happened over a period of months. Sometimes a few months isn’t enough time to personally gather enough information. I was seeing more and more stories about people who were getting the shot and wound up in the hospital with myocarditis, heart inflammation, and heart attack,” said Strauss.
Strauss had a surgery and is in his 60s, Strauss said the risk reward wasn’t great enough for him. So he decided not to get it. Strauss went to WJBC after spending 32 years as an award-winning sportscaster and news reporter at WEEK-TV, the NBC affiliate in Peoria. Strauss is married and has two children. Strauss told Cities he feels fortunate enough to be in a position where he didn’t have to give up his medical freedom.
“I was treated very well by the people at WJBC. The people that work there are fantastic people. The culture is great. This really had nothing to do with them. I know they weren’t comfortable with this. I know one of the managers in particular was very upset about this,” said Struass. “They will be fired if they don’t carry out orders.”
Strauss said he feels very bad for the managers at WJBC.
“When people look back on why certain things have happened in history, it’s because people didn’t stand up. While that’s not a crime itself, you end up being complicit,” said Strauss. “The moral compass of anybody that has to do a burning like that…it becomes a real inner conflict for those people.”
