On Wednesday's CNN Tonight, anchor Don Lemon hosted a segment to discuss the fact that rapper Kanye West has received criticism for praising President Donald Trump. The CNN host even alluded to West's history of accusing President George W. Bush of not caring about black Americans to then suggest that now West may not "care about black people."
Lemon began the segment: "Remember when Kanye West said out loud, 'George Bush doesn't care about black people'? Well, today, Kanye West has a lot of people wondering if he cares about black people.'"
After reading from a tweet praising Trump, he went to liberal CNN political commentator Marc Lamont Hill for reaction. As Hill criticized West over the matter, he also worked in praise for his history of attacking President Bush. Here's Hill:
I think it's weird. I think it's disappointing to me to see Kanye go from someone who had the courage to stand up and say, 'George Bush doesn't care about black people,' which is a courageous moment of protection and defense of black people and the vulnerable in general, to go to that and defending someone whose campaign was predicated upon white supremacy, white nationalism, erasure of immigrant voices, etc., etc., etc. It's really disappointing.
The liberal CNN commentator also claimed that West has made money off "vulnerable people" as he soon added:
People have a right to believe what they want, and Kanye has a right to believe what he wants. We have a right to hold him accountable for it. And because he's made so much money off of vulnerable people in the sense that he makes music for black people -- he makes music for brown people -- he makes music that poor people love. To then defend a President and express love for a President whose policies operate against those interests, to me, is just disappointing.
The panel of four only included one conservative as CNN commentator Paris Dennard -- who worked for the Bush administration -- and Washington Post associate editor David Swerdlick also appeared.
