Geraldo says he was wrong about Trump: I lost friends over my support, but ‘critics were much more right than I’

July 22, 2019 | | Print Article

Geraldo Rivera continued his denunciation of President Donald Trump and his remarks about four Democratic congresswomen, announcing that Trump’s critics “were much more right than I.”

The Fox News correspondent and self-proclaimed “friend” of Trump spoke out again about the president’s controversial tweets and comments calling out Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Michigan’s Rashida Tlaib.

(File Photo: screenshot)

“My friendship with the president has cost me friendships, it has cost me schisms in the family, my wife and I are constantly at odds about the president,” Rivera told  The New York Times.

“I do insist that he’s been treated unfairly. But the unmistakable words, the literal words he said, is an indication that the critics were much more right than I,” he said.

The longtime Trump ally claimed that the president’s comments “made it impossible” for him to defend him amid claims of racism.

“As much as I have denied it and averted my eyes from it, this latest incident made it impossible,” he said.

The president sparked the controversy last week when he appeared to target the progressive freshmen House members, tweeting that they should ​”go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.​”

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi stepped in to introduce a House resolution to condemn the president’s attack on the women, which was ultimately passed.  But the president passionately doubled down in a press conference of his own, condemning the lawmakers who “hate our country,” as he has continued to say in the days following.

More backlash followed Trump’s campaign rally in North Carolina, in which the crowd chanted “send her back” at one point as he spoke about Omar. Trump indicated that he was not happy about the chants.

“I disagree with it,” he said, noting that he “didn’t say that, they did,” and pointed out that he continued speaking without acknowledging the crowd’s chant.

On Sunday, the president stood his ground and said he didn’t believe the congresswomen in the “Squad” are “capable of loving our Country.”

Rivera has been struggling to defend Trump in the wake of the war of words with the Democratic congresswomen, telling Fox News last week that he was “saddened” by the president using the “language of racism and xenophobia.”

“But for the president to punch down and to unite the Democrats, it just is unnecessary,” he said, speaking on the difficulty in defending Trump – which he has often done – against the criticism he felt was justified.

“You know when I defend him I do so against all these gratuitous attacks in the media. He has the worst press of any president in modern history and yet he does things like this that leaves himself open to the criticism that he is exactly what the people who hate him say he is and I feel it’s very unfortunate,” Rivera said.

He addressed the issue again in a clash with Fox News’ Pete Hegseth last week, condemning the “send her back” chant by the Trump rally crowd.

“A lot of people are not grateful to be here. Gratitude is not a requirement,” Rivera said.

Rivera continued his commentary on Twitter , where he declared that anyone who loves the president has to “have the courage to call him out when he goes too far.”

But Rivera, once again, was not finding a sympathetic audience for his views on Trump. Many Twitter users slammed him again for not defending his “friend” and president.

Frieda Powers

Frieda Powers

Senior Staff Writer
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Originally from New York, Powers graduated from New York University and eventually made her way to sunny South Florida where she has been writing for the BizPacReview team since 2015.
Frieda Powers

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