NewsNation host Chris Cuomo was on a tear this week; using his prime-time show to call out the anti-Semitic/pro-Hamas extremists encamped on college campuses across the country. He called the encampments the “frightening intersection of ignorance and arrogance” and raised the legitimate concern that the students were being radicalized into doing something much worse than occupying a building.
In the hour before the NYPD busted up the encampment at Columbia University Tuesday night, Cuomo shared a soundbite from a press conference where one of the terrorist sympathizers demanded the administration give them food and water. “But this is like basic humanitarian aid asking for. Like, could people please have a glass of water?” the student whined.
Cuomo rubbed his face in frustration (above) and asked: “Seriously? Seriously? You want to break the law and then get catering?” He correctly diagnosed the problem as “privilege” and noted “she wasn't even aware of it.”
He argued that what we were seeing on these campuses was the “frightening intersection of ignorance and arrogance.” And speaking directly at the students, he called them out for wanting to “appropriate the suffering in Gaza as if that were you; just not the suffering part.”
“What happened to hunger strikes, getting arrested, taking a prosecution for the cause? Change doesn't come easy. Change doesn't come without cost,” he told them off. “You are being treated with kid gloves and you better hope it stays that way.”
On Monday, Cuomo struck a similar tone when he called out the cowardly students for hiding their faces when they claimed their cause was so just:
Who put them in this position? The kids should offer up their names. Don't hide behind the scarves. You want the light? Take the heat! Own it! Be accountable for your outrage. There’s nothing wrong with that. Yeah. You may get thrown out of school. What matters if it's a genocide? Right? If ‘we are Hamas,’ right? Don't hide!
“Give up your parents’ names,” he also demanded. “‘Oh, they shouldn't have to answer for me.’ The Hell they shouldn't. I got one of you. If my kid was running around on campus doing what you guys are doing, I'd be answering for it. I promise you that.”
The focus stayed on what the pro-Hamas students were capable of and Cuomo feared their radicalism could drive them to do things far worse. He recalled the case of John Walker Lindh, the American Taliban. “Well-to-do, converted to Islam as a teenager, went overseas, became radicalized, wound up helping terror organizations,” Cuomo recalled. “How do we know that people aren’t being radicalized today that it ends on campus? How do we know?”
Cuomo cautioned that social media – particularly TikTok – was to blame for how Generation Z has seemingly taken up the banner of Radical Islam in mass. “We never had people shouting ‘We are the Taliban’ after 9/11…We didn't have social media, but we didn't have whoever is guiding these things and funding these things being as active, as well-equipped, and as effective as they are right now,” he said.
The transcripts are below. Click "expand" to read:
NewsNation’s Cuomo
April 29, 2024
8:07:50 p.m. easternCHRIS CUOMO: Who put them in this position? The kids should offer up their names. Don't hide behind the scarves. You want the light? Take the heat! Own it! Be accountable for your outrage. There’s nothing wrong with that. Yeah. You may get thrown out of school. What matters if it's a genocide? Right? If ‘we are Hamas,’ right? Don't hide!
Give up your parents’ names. “Oh, they shouldn't have to answer for me.” The Hell they shouldn't. I got one of you. If my kid was running around on campus doing what you guys are doing, I'd be answering for it. I promise you that. That's my kid. Doesn't matter how old you are. You're not paying your way there. You're under somebody else's roof, somebody else's influence. And it's time they step up.
And the people who are funding these protests. Where are you? Where are the organizations? The invisible hand that is motivating what we're seeing on social media, who is it, where are they? Where's the investigative reporting on that? This has to be exposed.
And to the parents and to the people out there who say, “Hey look, these kids are angry, we saw it during BLM, it's going to be summer. This will dissipate. They're going to go home to their internships and all the other bull – B – you know, stuff they do.” Maybe, maybe not. I'll tell you why. I don't see it that way.
My last point. Three words for you. That is a lesson from the past that I don't know that we learned judging by what I'm seeing right now. Johnnie Walker Lindh. Look them up; L-I-N-D-H. Young kid, I forget where he grew up. Maybe California, something like that. Well-to-do, converted to Islam as a teenager, went overseas, became radicalized, wound up helping terror organizations. Put in prison 17 years. Got out a few years earl, everybody got angry about it.
How do we know that people aren’t being radicalized today that it ends on campus? How do we know? We never had people shouting “We are the Taliban” after 9/11. Right? Do you remember that? Are you old enough to remember? If not, not Google it. We didn't have social media, but we didn't have whoever is guiding these things and funding these things being as active, as well-equipped, and as effective as they are right now. How do you know it ends with talk?
(…)
April 30, 2024
8:03:34 p.m. EasternPRO-HAMAS PROTESTER: But this is like basic humanitarian aid asking for. Like, could people please have a glass of water?
CUOMO: [Rubs face in frustration] Seriously? Seriously? You want to break the law and then get catering? You talk about privilege. And she wasn't even aware of it. That is frightening intersection of ignorance and arrogance. You want to appropriate the suffering in Gaza as if that were you; just not the suffering part.
What happened to hunger strikes, getting arrested, taking a prosecution for the cause? Change doesn't come easy. Change doesn't come without cost. Go look at what happened during BLM. How blacks and their allies were treated when they destroyed property. And that was in poor areas, let alone some fancy place like a rich college campus.
You are being treated with kid gloves and you better hope it stays that way.
(…)
