Companies pull ads from TV station after comments on tattooing and sending migrants to Auschwitz

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Commentators who joked on a Polish right-wing television station that migrants should be sent to Auschwitz or be tattooed or microchipped like dogs are facing widespread condemnation

WARSAW, Poland — Prosecutors in Poland are investigating after commentators joked on a right-wing television station that migrants should be sent to Auschwitz or be tattooed or microchipped like dogs, and some companies have pulled advertising from the broadcaster.

The remarks were made over the past week by guests on TV Republika, a private station whose role as a platform for conservative views grew after the national conservative party, Law and Justice, lost control of the Polish government and public media.

During its eight years in power, Law and Justice turned taxpayer-funded state television into a platform for programming that cast largescale migration into Europe as an existential danger. The state media broadcast conspiracy theories, such as a claim that liberal elites wanted to force people to eat bugs, as well as antisemitic and homophobic content and attacks on the party's opponents, including the new Prime Minister Donald Tusk.

Spreading hate speech is a crime under Polish law. While public TV stations were shielded from market and legal pressures under the previous government, TV Republika now faces both.

IKEA said it was pulling its advertising from the station, prompting some conservative politicians to urge people to boycott the Swedish home goods giant. Other companies, including Carrefour and MasterCard subsequently said they were pulling their ads, too.

The controversial on-air statements were made as the European Union has been trying to overhaul its outdated asylum system, including with a plan to relocate migrants