‘Slick’ Tom Tiberi has exited nights at Cumulus Classic Rock “97 Rock” 96.9 WGRF Buffalo NY after sharing a meme of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin laying in coffins on his personal Facebook page that he claims was doctored by others to look like he posted it following Trump’s assassination attempt last weekend.
Tiberi, who has been at WGRF (and predecessor WGRQ) in multiple stints since the early 1980s, shared the following statement:
Last Thursday I shared a dark humored FB meme about former President Trump, on my personal FB page.
Was it in poor taste? Yes, it was. However, the point I need to stress is that this meme was put up BEFORE the assassination attempt on Saturday, I then took it down immediately! However, by then a small but well-organized group of far-right extremist on FB had taken a screen shot of my meme and posted it all over public FB and to their private far right FB groups. This included posting phone numbers and e-mail addresses of Cumulus local and corporate Cumulus management. The screen shot they shared made it look like I had posted the meme AFTER the assassination attempt rather than on Thursday. This small group of individuals have succeeded in getting me fired from 97 Rock, as Cumulus local management crumbled under the pressure from this small group of lunatics. Make no mistake, this was a well-organized hit job! Funny, these are the very same people who whine about cancel culture and freedom of speech. For now, I would like to express my deep affection and thanks to all my loyal listeners that have welcomed me into their homes and supported me over the last 25 years. You are more than listeners to me; you are and will always be my true friends. Let us just say so long for now, as I’ll be back!!
A request for comment to Cumulus has gone unanswered as of this writing.
Tiberi’s radio career began in 1979 at 1400 WYSL Buffalo and outside of brief stints early in his career in Nashville and Winston-Salem, he has remained in his hometown since joining “97 Rock” in 1982. His most recent stint at WGRF began in 2010 when he returned to the station after being part of budget cuts two years prior following a two decade run in nights from 1988 to 2008. He has also worked in the market at stations including WBYR, WECK, and WZIR.
INSTANT INSIGHT: Reason #8787234 that personal politics and music radio should not mix. While Tiberi shared the meme on his personal account, he did so as a representative of WGRF and Cumulus. Anything said in a public space that could lead to loss of advertising revenue or negative publicity will likely put a talent at risk.
It also didn’t help that this is the second incident in recent years regarding talent from WGRF. In 2021, then-morning host Rob Lederman was fired after comments made on-air where he compared how he likes toast to the skin tones of black women. A few weeks later the station parted ways with the remainder of the morning show and WGRF’s Program Director.
This story first appeared on radioinsight.com