Fox News’ Geraldo Rivera slammed Sen. Kamala Harris for drawing parallels between ICE agents and the Ku Klux Klan.
“Shame on Senator Harris,” Rivera exclaimed Thursday, reacting to the California Democrat’s questioning of a nominee for assistant Homeland Security secretary for Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
During a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing Thursday, Harris asked Trump immigration nominee Ronald Vitiello about the “perception” that ICE is “causing fear and intimidation” like the KKK.
“That puts ICE in the same category as the KKK. Is that what you’re asking me?” Vitiello asked.
“Are you aware that there’s a perception that, that ICE is administering its power in a way that is causing fear and intimidation particularly among immigrants and specifically among immigrants coming from Mexico and Central America?” Harris, a potential 2020 presidential contender asked as Vitiello again shut down the insinuation.
“How can you be the head of an agency and be unaware of how your agency is perceived by certain communities?” Harris shot back.
Rivera unloaded on the lawmaker during Thursday’s “Hannity” on Fox News Channel.
“Shame on Senator Harris, someone with great experience and obvious intellect, for her to be so intellectually lazy as to stoop to a comparison between our hardworking law enforcement, however you agree or disagree with their mission,” he said.
“And comparing them to a violent, racist, terrorist organization. I mean, she knows better, and she really owes every one of those ICE agents an apology,” he told host Sean Hannity.
“Border agents risk their lives,” Hannity interjected.
“They absolutely do. And what she said was beyond the pale. It’s like one of my pet peeves is when people say, ‘ahh he’s a Nazi, he’s a KKK [member],’” Rivera added. “It insults all the real victims of racist terrorism, in the case of the KKK, and all the people, the genocidal victims of the Nazis, the industrialized power that sought to wipe out people. So I think that our elected officials have to leave those comparisons aside.”
Rivera took to Twitter as well to call on Harris to apologize.
Like lazy trolls who call cops Nazis, it is grossly irresponsible to compare anything other than violent racist terrorists to the #KKK. @KamalaHarris is way too savvy to be so intellectually lazy. She should apologize to #ICE agents now.
— Geraldo Rivera (@GeraldoRivera) November 16, 2018
“The rare instances where Geraldo and I agree,” guest panelist Herman Cain said, “we agree that the parallel that Kamala Harris tried to grow is absolutely despicable.”
Rivera doubled down on his criticism during “Fox & Friends” on Friday morning.
“Kamala Harris is way too savvy, way too experienced, way too smart to try to compare a group of federal law enforcement agents with a racist, violent, terrorist organization,” he said.
“It’s like people who compare others to Nazis. I can’t stand it. It is appalling. She should apologize to the ICE agents right now. They have nothing in common with the KKK,” he added.
“And to suggest that, to raise that specter of violent, racist terrorism as being the motivating force behind American immigration enforcement is really beyond the pale,” Rivera continued. “That is not politics. That’s slander. She should apologize right now to those ICE agents. I have my own problems with ICE enforcement and removal. I think that sometimes, the dark of night, I don’t like it, but it has nothing to do with these, you know, these historical obscenities that she is invoking for a cheap political thrill.”
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