Phoenix Anchor Fired for Twitter "Likes"

KPHO/KTVK Sports Anchor Joe Pequeno has left the station and the reason appears to be because of thousands of tweets that he “liked” on Twitter.

The Atlantic reports that Meredith, owner of KPHO/KTVK had launched an investigation into over 2000 “Likes” that Pequeno made on his Twitter account.

Meredith’s corporate communications manager Kara Kelly released a statement saying, “ Joe Pequeno is stepping aside from Arizona Family. He has decided to pursue a new career opportunity. We thank him for his service and wish him well.”

Word is that the many of the “likes” on Twitter were tweets that contained anti-muslim messages. Over the Memorial Day Weekend, Pequeno appeared to delete almost 2,000 of his “likes” from his Twitter account.

Pequeno told The Athletic that his account had been hacked. When told that the “likes” spanned a 3 year period, Pequeno still claimed that it was hackers that were responsible for the “likes.”

His Twitter account has since been deleted.

Pequeno has been at the Meredith station’s since 2011, he came to the KPHO/KTVK from across the street at KPNX.