Media Has Meltdown Over Trump Vulgarity

CNN host Don Lemon began his show Thursday night by labeling President Trump as “racist” in the wake of reports that the president called Haiti and African nations “shithole countries.”

“The president of the United States is racist,” Lemon said at the opening of his show. “A lot of us already knew that.”

According to The Hill, Lemon was responding to reports from The Washington Post and other media outlets that Trump referred to immigrants from Haiti and African countries as coming from “shithole countries.”

“Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here?” Trump reportedly said in an Oval Office meeting with lawmakers while discussing protections for immigrants from several countries.

Trump then reportedly said that the U.S. should bring in more immigrants from countries like Norway, whose prime minister he met with the previous day.

Lemon called those remarks “disgusting.”

“There’s other language I’d like to use, but we are on television,” Lemon said. “But you know what? They’re not shocking. They’re not even really surprising. Because this is who Donald Trump is.”

Earlier Thursday, Lemon’s fellow CNN host Anderson Cooper slammed Trump’s remarks, calling them “racist.”

In a statement Thursday, the White House did not deny Trump’s “shithole” comments.

Over at Fox, host Tucker Carlson on Thursday night questioned the backlash over President Trump's reported remarks on accepting some immigrants from "shithole countries."

The Hill reports Carlson said it would be dishonest to say one would rather live in Norway, a country where Trump reportedly suggested that the U.S. focus on bringing in immigrants, rather than Haiti.

"So if you say Norway is a better place to live and Haiti is kind of a hole, well anyone who’s been to those countries or has lived in them would agree. But we’re jumping up and down, ‘Oh, you can’t say that.’ Why can’t you say that?" Carlson asked following amid bipartisan criticism of Trump's remarks.

Fox News host Jesse Watters also defended Trump's remark Thursday, arguing that the "forgotten men and women" who make up the president's base would approve of the comment.