Fox News host Martha MacCallum kept up the network’s tradition of race baiting funerals of African Americans, in this case by harping on Louis Farrakhan’s presence at Aretha Franklin’s funeral.

It’s hard to think of a recently-deceased prominent African American whose funeral Fox News has not used as an excuse to race bait: After Michael Jackson’s funeral, Bill O’Reilly sneered, “If (Jackson) were a white guy, his bizarre behavior would never have been tolerated,” and “You don’t become an African American icon” if you bleach your skin; Michael Reagan whined that the “faces of Katrina” featured at Coretta Scott King’s funeral didn’t include white people. Fox also has a long history of race baiting Martin Luther King Day.

It’s even harder to think of a single instance where Fox turned down an opportunity to use Louis Farrakhan as an uber-racial boogeyman – except when he praised Donald Trump.

So with the appearance of Louis Farrakhan at Aretha Franklin’s funeral yesterday, there was no doubt in my mind that Fox News would start racially concern trolling. Last night, with all the prime time shows pre-recorded, Martha MacCallum, the 7 PM ET host, got the honor.

The segment started with highlights from the funeral that lasted less than a minute. “There were some beautiful performances today at Aretha Franklin’s funeral in Detroit,” MacCallum said, with showy appreciation. “The guests ranging from world leaders to musical legends and one especially controversial figure who was seated in the front row, many people kind of wondering what the unapologetic anti-Semite, Louis Farrakhan, was doing up there.” MacCallum didn’t say, “black militant” but it was probably understood by Fox viewers.

MacCallum then spent the next two minutes whining about Farrakhan, as if that were the single most important feature of Franklin’s funeral.

Just to let us know that MacCallum could appreciate a black woman’s funeral, she talked about how “moving, moving” the ceremony was and how “amazing” performances by Jennifer Hudson and Gladys Knight were. “But I kept finding myself distracted by Louis Farrakhan who was in every single shot. I’m thinking what is he doing there?” MacCallum added.

And I’m thinking, “Why would you care so much?” But, predictably, not one of the three guests questioned MacCallum's focus.

Weekly Standard writer Kelly Jane Torrance was all in on the gameplan. “It’s interesting that you saw him,” she said, claiming that other media cut Farrakhan out of their shots. That could be because he’s not as prominent as others in the front row, such as President Bill Clinton, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. But Torrance, without having talked to a single media outlet, insisted that Farrakhan was left out of their shots because “clearly, they thought, ‘Wow, why is this guy there, too?’”

“And something that’s supposed to be about Aretha Franklin,” MacCallum continued, “became, I thought, in many ways, about some of these gentlemen who were right behind.” As if it wasn’t MacCallum’s fault that she was the one now making it so.

Guest Kylie Patterson noted that Franklin was a big figure in the civil rights movement and that she probably wanted Farrakhan (who still plays a significant role) at her funeral.

Still, MacCallum wouldn’t let it drop. “I just wonder how much jockeying there was for prime position and I saw he was kind of pushing his website and all of this on Twitter and I thought, ‘Gee, that’s kind of a little bit unfortunate,’ that it was distracting in that way. You know, he has said awful things about Jewish people, about white people, about gay people, and I thought it was never the message that I heard in Aretha Franklin’s music.”

So, maybe Franklin and Farrakhan were good friends but had disagreements in that regard? It was telling that with all that “concern,” MacCallum made no apparent effort to find out why, in fact, Farrakhan was there or what his relationship with Franklin was.

But MacCallum had more politicization up her sleeve. She moved on to accusing Bill Clinton of learing at Arianna Grande from behind.

Watch MacCallum play funeral monitor below, from the August 31, 2018 The Story with Martha MacCallum.

(H/T Mediaite)