Despite no significant prompting, former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo proceeded into an unwarranted racially charged crash-out against Vice President Kamala Harris on The Chris Cuomo Project, exposing both his increasing hostility toward Democrats and a troubling practice of coded language targeting Black politicians.
“Kamala Harris is not a godsend, alright?” Cuomo declared. “You people didn’t even like her six months ago! Now, all of a sudden, she’s Black female Jesus, the way Obama was Black Jesus.”
The NewsNation host, not unlike former president Donald Trump, then pivoted to diminishing Harris’s qualifications compared to Obama: “He had a lot more going for him than Kamala Harris does—and not just as firsts go—but his type of campaigning, his type of persuasion, his charisma. He was imbued with things that she is not.”
Cuomo’s attacks centered particularly on Harris’s path to the Democratic nomination, claiming “her process f***** her also because there are a lot of misgivings about her. There is an underlying feeling that she didn’t get this the right way; she may not have won a primary. She didn’t even make it to the first round of primaries when she did run.”
The former anchor brazenly dismissed concerns about criticizing Harris during campaign season, stating, “This idea of, ‘Don’t say anything bad about her because Trump,’ I don’t buy that, and it’s not how you get to a better place. It’s a relative assessment. She has negatives. So does he. Does he have more? Yeah. He also has a way more intense following. That’s why this race is so tight.”
The problem here is that Cuomo is demanding critique inside a race that is now nearly over when this is a critical period of shoring up voter turnout and locking in votes. There is even a falseness in how he compares Harris and Trump, in his acknoledgement of the latter’s issues, as if his outspoken authoritarian desires can be remotely justified or made equal in whatever Harris’ relatlvely minor warts actually are in comparison.
Most revealing was Cuomo’s defensive stance toward Trump supporters while attacking Harris, where he somehow misses the forest for the trees: “Unless you want to write off half this country as bigots, how do you explain it being so tight? Maybe you’re not as right about everything as you think you are. Maybe you should be a little bit more open to the people that you disagree with. Maybe they’re not all racists.” They may not all be racist, but he doesn’t exactly explain away the prevelant racism that does exist nor fascist attitudes of the Trump/Vance ticket.
Cuomo’s somewhat predictable transformation from former mainstream media darling to right-wing talking point amplification tool suggests slightly less-then-principled evolution based on emotions (after being fired from CNN, controversy around his older brother, etc.) and not necessarily some grand change in the Democratic Party.
His comfort with unhinged commentary—targeting the first woman and first person of color to serve as Vice President, indicates he’s willing to torch every bridge in pursuit of relevance in the media landscape.
Published: Oct 25, 2024 04:04 am