If it’s MLK Day, it’s time for MLK’s right-wing, Trump loving niece Alveda King to appear on Fox & Friends to whitewash (pun intended) the social justice legacy of her uncle, while pushing right-wing talking points. This year was a little different with King and Pete Hegseth pushing different propaganda messages, neither of which had any real connection to MLK.
Fox & Friends cohost Pete Hegseth began the interview with video from President Biden’s Martin Luther King Day speech at Dr. King’s Ebenezer Baptist Church. In introducing “Dr. Alveda King” (her degree is honorary), Hegseth said that “it’s always a blessing to see you.”
Hegseth wasted no time working in the requisite propaganda message which, in this case, was Fox’s newest “outrage” – the evils of “equity.” He said that “there were terms” added to Biden’s homily “that make it feel like it sounds political” – which, of course, is the intent of this sweet and innocent interview. He added that there is another conversation “which emphasizes equity when your uncle talked about equality." (Tucker Carlson has said that equity is racist.)
King, who defended former President Trump against charges of racism, began her standard “Santa Clausification” (or whitewashing) of MLK. After a strange anecdote about playing the "opposite game," she said that she and her family always believed that there was just one human race and that “we must learn to live together as brothers and sisters.” She also said MLK was warning against “race baiting.” She claimed that her uncle preached that “making big issues over skin color doesn’t make any sense.” While she acknowledged that Biden spoke “great platitudes,” she asked what he intends to do.
Staying with the anti-diversity theme, Hegseth responded, “it feels like what they’re doing about it is pushing things like diversity, equity, inclusion, that divide us even more, emphasize that ethnicity, rather than our common bonds.” (Hegseth is concerned about dividing people? OH, the IRONY!)
In classic call and response, King agreed that his statement “was exactly the truth.” Although it was framed rather incoherently, she seemed to say that people who oppose transgender are being unfairly maligned as “evil.” (Nice working in of the classic Fox anti-transgender meme) She expressed concern about people who are “calling everything evil that this country was actually founded on and to say I care about America, but let’s just change the playbook totally and let people do exactly what they want to do regardless of whether anybody gets hurt or not." More call and response with Hegseth saying “Exactly right.”
Color me cynical, but somehow, I really don’t think that Martin Luther King, Jr. would be speaking out against equity or the transgender community. Not sure if that’s where Hegseth and King were going; but one thing is for sure, as a celebration of MLK’s legacy, this piece was, as always, an epic fail.
You can watch it below, from the January 16, 2023 Fox & Friends.