White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was visibly stunned after CBS’s Ed O’Keefe asked for examples of President Donald Trump being “falsely called racist” in recent years.
“You’re kidding, right?” replied Leavitt during a White House press briefing on Wednesday.
She was responding to O’Keefe’s question, which quoted Trump’s tribute to Jesse Jackson a day earlier.
O’Keefe said:
In his statement about Jesse Jackson, the president said “Despite the fact that I am falsely inconsistently called a racist by the scoundrels and lunatics on the radical left, Democrats all, it was always my pleasure to help Jesse along the way.” Where or when does the president believe he has been falsely called racist?
That spurred Leavitt’s shocked response and led to a few audible chuckles in the briefing room.
“I will pull you plethora of examples. I’m going to get my team in that room to start going through the internet of radical Democrats throughout the years who have accused this president falsely of being a racist,” Leavitt said.
She continued, “And I’m sure there’s many people in this room and on network television across the country who have accused him of the same. In fact, I know that because I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”
Leavitt added that Trump was looking forward to a Black History Month event scheduled for later in the day.
“There is a lot this president has done for all Americans, regardless of race,” she said. “And he has absolutely been falsely called and smeared as a racist, and I’m happy to provide you those receipts.”
Trump’s racial attitudes have long been called out by high-profile media personalities. Ex-CNN star Don Lemon branded Trump a “racist” in 2018, and called him a “racist piece of sh*t” last year. Another CNN alum, Jim Acosta, said in 2018 “this president deep down may just be a racist.” MS NOW anchor Lawrence O’Donnell dubbed Trump the “most racist” president who never owned slaves in 2024, and his colleague, Chris Hayes, called Trump “to his bones a racist” after he posted a video depicting ex-President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama as apes earlier this month.
Other examples include NBC White House correspondent Yamiche Alcindor accusing Trump of using a “racist term” when he called COVID-19 the “kung-flu,” CBS reporter Weijia Jiang similarly said Trump used “racist phrases” during the pandemic, and Geraldo Rivera — a former longtime friend of the president’s — referring to Trump’s crackdown on migrants as “racist government policy.”
And soon after the press briefing wrapped up, one of the White House’s X accounts posted an example of O’Keefe himself calling out Trump for “racist tweets” in 2019:
Watch above via Fox News.
The post ‘You’re Kidding, Right?’ Karoline Leavitt Gobsmacked After Reporter Asks for Examples of Trump Being ‘Falsely Called Racist’ first appeared on Mediaite.
