FNC’s Geraldo: ‘I Was a Product of Affirmative Action’

Friday, during his last day at the Fox News Channel after his departure from “The Five,” long-time TV personality Geraldo Rivera used the moment to credit affirmative action for the launch of his career.

Rivera made his remarks on the heels of the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down so-called race-based admissions at colleges and universities.

“[I] thank you for the opportunity because affirmative action has just been voted down by the Supreme Court of the United States in a very controversial decision that will impact many people of color,” he said during Friday’s broadcast of FNC’s “The Five.” “I was a product of affirmative action over a half a century ago … When the Ford Foundation and Columbia Journalism School got together to integrate the local news teams in New York, there were no black reporters, no Hispanic reporters, no women.”

“And it was shocking,” Geraldo Rivera continued. “And that was as late as 1968, 69. So I was selected. I was making news representing a group of Puerto Rican activists, the Young Lords, who had taken over some buildings up in the Spanish Harlem. And I was their lawyer and their negotiator. And I made a lot of news as their spokesperson. And so I got discovered that way, and they drafted me through the Columbia program, and the rest is history.”

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