Monday, CNN’s Anderson Cooper opened his show with a monologue criticizing President Donald Trump’s handling of nationwide protests and looting in response to the death of George Floyd.
Cooper said, “He wanted to stand outside, hold up the Bible and have photos taken of himself with his cabinet members. It was surreal — a photo op at the church that he rarely attends. His daughter and son-in-law also on hand. Let me just say something about what the president has just shown us. The president of law and order as he now calls himself, which is how he pronounced himself, and then he claimed a power he doesn’t really have. He can’t send the military into every state. That’s not law and order. What the president doesn’t seem to know or care is that the vast majority of those protesting — they, too, are calling for law and order. A black man killed with four officers holding him down, a knee to the neck for more than eight minutes, nearly three minutes of which he was no longer conscious for, that’s not law and order. That’s murder. Stopping and frisking a young black man simply because he’s a black man, that’s not law and order.”
He continued, “The killing of George Floyd, Eric Garner, the torture of Abner Louima that’s not law and order. The president seems to think that dominating black people, dominating peaceful protesters, is law and order. It’s not. He calls them thugs. Who is the thug here? Hiding in a bunker, hiding behind a suit, who is the thug? People have waited for days for this wannabe war-time president to say something, and this is what he says, and that is what he does.”
He added, “I’ve seen societies fall apart as a reporter. I’ve seen people dying in the streets while protesting. I’ve seen countries ripped apart by hate and misinformation and lies and political demagogues and racism. We can’t let that happen here.”
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