BBC Breakfast presenter Naga Munchetty made no reference to the racism row she recently became embroiled in as she returned to the show on Thursday.
Last week, the presenter made headlines when the BBC’s Executive Complaints Unit ruled she had breached the corporation’s impartiality guidelines when she passed comment on racist tweets posted by US president Donald Trump.
After the decision was heavily criticised in the media, including by several of her BBC colleagues, director-general Tony Hall announced that he was overturning the ruling, saying: “In this instance, I don’t think Naga’s words were sufficient to merit a partial uphold of the complaint around the comments she made.”
On Thursday morning, Naga returned to BBC Breakfast after taking a short holiday with friends, which she’d been posting about on social media throughout her break, but avoided mentioning the matter completely during the live show.
She also did not comment to reporters who were outside the show’s studios in Salford, Greater Manchester, when she arrived.
She was driven in a black Audi to within inches of the door and rushed inside shielded by security staff.
The controversy surrounded comments Naga made in an off-script moment during a live broadcast back in July.
Responding to Trump’s tweets suggesting four Democratic politicians should “go back” to their home countries, Naga said she was “absolutely furious”, noting: “Every time I have been told, as a woman of colour, to go back to where I came from, that was embedded in racism.
“Now, I’m not accusing anyone of anything here, but you know what certain phrases mean.”
The tweets in question had been written about US politicians Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ayanna Pressley. All four are US citizens, and three of them were born in America.