Fox News’ Griff Jenkins tossed aside his “correspondent” hat as he cohosted for Fox & Friends and became a soldier in Donald Trump’s war on black athletes and freedom of expression during the national anthem.
Fox’s bio of Jenkins describes him as a “Washington-based correspondent,” in other words, a supposedly objective journalist. But joining his cohosts in cheerleading Trump was not enough for Jenkins this morning. He suggested that Trump go to a Redskins football game tonight and taunt the athletes taking a knee during the national anthem by standing and putting his hand over his heart.
It’s not as though the Trump cheerleading and sycophancy over his war on black athletes wasn’t already pretty thick from the all-white Curvy Couch Crew. In the previous hour, cohost Pete Hegseth singled out NBA star Steph Curry for contempt after he refused Trump’s invitation to the White House and dared to suggest Trump is picking on black athletes out of racial animus.
In this hour, the Curvy Couch ratcheted up their antagonism toward more athletes in order to talk up Trump. Matt Wilstein, at The Daily Beast, has a good write up:
In response to Oakland A’s catcher Bruce Maxwell, who became the first MLB player to kneel during the national anthem Saturday night, Hegseth complained, “It’s infected the NFL and the NBA and and now we see it happen in Major League Baseball.” Abby Huntsman, meanwhile, wondered aloud if the cameras would show the kneeling players on Sunday or train their focus on the American flag instead.
“Look at those 12 teams immediately putting out a statement calling the president’s statement divisive!” Hegseth added. “And you have to ask, what are we kneeling for at this point? Because you talk about social injustice. This is the least sexist, least racist, most free, most equal, most prosperous country in the history of humankind.”
“That’s the divisive action, taking a knee,” he said. “As opposed to have a civil conversation.” (All emphases mine
The whitesplaining lecture was bad enough. But claiming that our freedoms deny anyone the right to free speech is even worse.
Jenkins, undoubtedly aware that sitting in the recently-vacated cohost spot could become permanent if he played his cards right, looked like he was trying to one-up the Trump love/black-athlete hate:
JENKINS: Let me just suggest this: The Raiders play the Redskins tonight. … It would be interesting if President Trump showed up on the sidelines at the Redskins’ game, put his hand over his heart and stood for the National Anthem.
Hegseth, who had just complained about the athletes being divisive, seemed to endorse the idea. He added, “And maybe wearing a Redskins’ jersey. ‘Cause he’s from DC.”
On Fox & Friends, there’s no such thing as being too divisive so long as it’s in the service of promoting Trump.
Watch this latest Fox episode of Blacks Behaving Badly, from the September 24, 2017 Fox & Friends, via The Daily Beast.