Former Fox News conservative political pundit Bill O’Reilly was asked to discuss former President Donald Trump‘s live interview with the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ), which is making headlines.
The GOP presidential nominee — a so-called “birther” who got his start in national politics by consistently questioning Barack Obama‘s citizenship — controversially questioned the racial identity of his new election opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, whose mother was born in India and whose father was born in Jamaica.
Implying Harris used her racial background selectively for political advantage, Trump said of Harris: “She was always of Indian heritage and she was only promoting Indian heritage.” He added: “I didn’t know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black and now she wants to be known as Black. So I don’t know, is she Indian or is she Black?”
O’Reilly told Cuomo immediately after the interview that “Donald Trump blew it,” and “the happiest person in the country tonight is Kamala Harris.”
When you lose Bill O’Reilly…
— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) August 1, 2024
“Donald Trump blew it, and the happiest person in the country tonight is Kamala Harris. She’s sitting there cackling, saying, look at this, look at Trump, he’s just alienated millions of Black voters…” pic.twitter.com/vUdqDftftC
O’Reilly added, “She’s sitting there cackling, [saying] ‘look at this, yeah, look at this, look at Trump he’s just alienated millions of Black voters,’ who aren’t really going to get what happened there.”
O’Reilly claimed that Trump is at fault for not being able to articulate his message that Harris “is a phony” — that she used “one bit of ethnicity to do this, and one bit of ethnicity to do that.”
What is Trump about when it comes to Kamala’s race? What is Trump about when it comes to immigrants taking black jobs? Neither really matters in the end. But Trump’s demagoguery matters. He is who he is pic.twitter.com/K74lQ1mvdh
— Christopher C. Cuomo (@ChrisCuomo) August 1, 2024
Note: Cuomo released his own take on the Trump interview, see above, which he referred to as “a major moment in this presidential election,” as “Donald Trump disrespected a room full of Black journalists on purpose.”
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