Former View co-host and current CNN host Lisa Ling appeared on her old show Friday to bash President Trump for calling COVID-19 the “Chinese virus.” The hosts let her spread lies about the President, while blaming him for her Asian friends and family being harassed. Ling even claimed that we can trust the numbers being put out by China’s communist government and that Trump should be asking them for help in combating the coronavirus.
Guest co-host Sara Haines, also a former co-host, first prompted Ling to elaborate on why she “called out” President Trump on Instagram for calling COVID-19 the “Chinese virus.” Ling claimed it was just a way for the President to “deflect blame” onto China because he was “the only person” who was calling it the Chinese virus.
In that Instagram post, Ling was even more vocal, repeating the lie that President Trump called the virus a “hoax” and basically blaming his “inaction” for causing the nation to be underprepared.
But co-host Sunny Hostin was ready to rip Trump over the supposed “dangerous” and “racist” term. She invited Ling to blame Trump directly because of alleged racism she personally experienced:
HOSTIN: Lisa, you know you’ve talked about how dangerous this is for the Asian American community. I couldn’t agree more. I completely agree with you. I was so infuriated when the President of the United States started calling it the China virus and the Wuhan virus.
Have any of you or any of your family or friends experienced any racism since the president started calling it the Chinese virus?
LING: Oh absolutely. I have friends, kids who’ve been taunted, I have friends who’ve talked about being harassed in places. And if you just Google stories about Asians being harassed since the president started calling this virus Chinese virus, there are countless stories.
Ling went on to claim that a national bullying text hotline has experienced a “sizable” increase of Asian Americans saying they are depressed because they are being bullied and being blamed for the crisis precisely because of Trump calling it the “Chinese virus.”
Meghan McCain disavowed bullying but pressed Ling on the need for their government to be criticized for suppressing news of the virus. While Ling acknowledged that their government should be criticized, she completely downplayed China’s role in letting the coronavirus become a global pandemic, choosing instead to blame Trump by repeating that “hoax” lie.
Ling even claimed that we could trust the Chinese government reporting they have no new cases of the virus and the United States should go to them for “help”:
This idea that had we, had we known the severity of it sooner would of made us prepare even sooner is somewhat ludicrous...up until it hit the United States, our president was in denial about it and still calling it a hoax.
(....)
We could sit here and blame China until we're blue in the face but how is that going to help us right now? ...So, focusing on blaming China isn't going to do us any good now. In fact, if anything, we should be asking China for help. They have reported no new cases of coronavirus. We should be saying, 'OK, how can you help us now,' because we are now the epicenter of the world.
