Posted Friday, January 12, 2018 by RODNEY HO/rho@ajc.com on his AJC Radio & TV Talk blog
CNN host Don Lemon was blunt Thursday night, calling President Donald Trump a racist after it was reported that Trump called Africa and Haiti a nasty expletive "s***hole."
He opened his newscast with this line: "The President of the United States is racist.”
“A lot of us already knew that,” Lemon added.
Trump told members of Congress: “Why are we having all these people from s***hole countries come here?” Then he suggested why not more immigrants come from Norway.
“Those comments are frankly disgusting," Lemon continued. "There’s other language I would like to use, but we are on television. But you know what? They’re not shocking. Not even really surprising, because this is who Donald Trump is. This is what he thinks.”
He then listed a litany of comments Trump has made that could be construed as racist. The fact the White House readily admits he is playing to his base implies that his base "welcomes racism and enjoys it. That is disgraceful."
Lemon didn't hold anything back: “This is for anyone who may be taken aback by my comments. I want to be clear here, I don’t care if you are. I hope you are.”
Lemon started his CNN career in Atlanta and moved to New York in 2014, where Jeff Zucker gave him a prime-time show at 10 p.m.
Earlier, an emotional Anderson Cooper gave a more impassioned plea in support of Haiti after covering the earthquakes there in 2010 and visiting the country many times.
“Haitians slap your hand hard when they shake it, they look you in the eye,” Cooper said. “They have a dignity. It’s a dignity many in this White House could learn from. It’s a dignity the president with all his money and all his power could learn from as well. On the anniversary of the earthquake, when this president has said what he’s said about Haitians, we hope the people in Haiti who are listening tonight, we hope they know that our thoughts are with them and that our love is with them as well.”
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