Keith Olbermann will return to MSNBC on Tuesday night after a two-day suspension, and though he is excited to get back to the airwaves, the embattled anchor had harsh words for the network that silenced him.
"I want to sincerely thank you for the honor of your extraordinary and ground-rattling support," Olbermann wrote in an open letter to viewers posted on his Twitter page Monday.
Olbermann was suspended from MSNBC on Friday after Politico revealed he had given campaign donations to three Democratic politicians: Jack Conway, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Kentucky, and Raul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords, two Arizona members of the House of Representatives.
"I was suspended without a hearing, and learned of that suspension through the media," Olbermann wrote. "I did not attempt to keep any of these political contributions secret."
The popular anchor slammed NBC for what he called "an inconsistently applied rule" and said he would have been willing to have an on-air discussion about the rules he "mistakenly violated" and explain his donations to viewers.
Olbermann said he never tried to hide the campaign contributions, writing, "When a website contacted NBC about one of the donations, I immediately volunteered that there were in fact three of them."
He also shot down a widely-circulated report that he could have avoided the suspension by issuing a mea culpa on air.
After hundreds of thousands of his viewers expressed their disappointment through online petitions and calls, the network announced Sunday that Olbermann would be back on the air on Tuesday.
"After several days of deliberation and discussion, I have determined that suspending Keith through and including Monday night's program is an appropriate punishment for his violation of our policy. We look forward to having him back on the air Tuesday night," MSNBC president Phil Griffin said in a statement Sunday.
Despite the dispute with his network, Olbermann said he looks forward to coming back to work.
"I genuinely look forward to rejoining you on Countdown on Tuesday, to begin the repayment of your latest display of support and loyalty," he wrote to his viewers. "Support and loyalty that is truly mutual."
nmandell@nydailynews.com
"A Statement to the Viewers of Countdown"
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