Pete Hegseth and Geraldo Rivera got into it this morning over Trump’s controversial tweets about The Squad:
Here’s more via DC Examiner:
Fox News personalities Pete Hegseth and Geraldo Rivera got into a heated argument about President Trump’s tweets directing four prominent liberal members of Congress to “go back” to their native countries if they’re unhappy with the status of America and the debacle that has since ensued.
“I was disappointed by his tweet that started this firestorm, and then when the crowd started that chant, I was appalled. I think it was, it was un-American. It was, an attack that was a nativist, xenophobic, racist attack,” Rivera stated during Friday’s Fox & Friends. “I didn’t like it. I’m not alone. Ivanka, the president’s daughter, also suggested to him he made perhaps a mistake in that initial ‘send her back’ stuff. You know, ‘go back to where you came from’ is a old racist trope that all of us, ethnic or racial minorities have grown up with at various times. It is unforgivable, this day and age.”
Hegseth countered, “Geraldo, but you, like many, accused him of racism. But if you go back and look at that tweet, he’s not talking about race. He is talking about whether or not you love this country and appreciate it, and if you don’t appreciate it and don’t love it and don’t want to work to make it better, then maybe you could consider going somewhere else.”
“What the Hell, come on Pete? This is their country. They are citizens of the United States,” Rivera responded.
They then argued over whether or not they could say “go back to where you came from” to each other.
“You can’t say it to me!” Rivera announced. “I’ve had ten street fights based on that, saying to me because I’m Puerto Rican, ‘Go back where you came from.’ I was born on 17th Street.”
Hegseth maintained his argument that race was not a part of the debate and that it’s rather about “a lack of gratitude.”
As I pointed out earlier this week, I wasn’t a fan of Trump’s tweets either. I think they were a very clunky way of making his point and that he could have done it in a much better way.
But given the context of the tweets themselves, it was also clear to me and to most reasonable minds that the tweets weren’t racist – even though much of the media continues to claim they were as though it’s a fact.
So I have to come down on the side of Hegseth here, even though his claim at the very end (that Trump didn’t say who he was talking about) was a a lame excuse. We all know who Trump was talking about.