On the same day that Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade praised Geraldo Rivera’s The Great Progression: How Hispanics Will Lead America to a New Era of Prosperity, he seemed to disparage Hispanic emergency room patients generally as “people seemingly without citizenship.” Before lauding Geraldo’s book, Kilmeade presided over a segment entitled, “Health Care Overhaul: Coverage for Illegals–Will Undocumented Benefit Under Reform?” During his interview of Phil Kent of Americans for Immigration Control, footage of people illegally entering the U.S. from Mexico ran and the effect of “cracking down on illegals” on Hispanic voters was discussed.
Toward the conclusion of the colloquy, Kilmeade lamented the fact that “people with citizenship, with insurance, wait while illegals get treated and that’s happening now and will happen under any revamp.” As he ended the segment, he said, “It’s just amazing! I know two or three personal stories of people just going to the emergency room (one broken finger, one twisted knee) and then just leaving because they can’t get waited on because of the long line of people seemingly without citizenship who are there that have to be treated ahead of them. And, they are the ones who are actually paying.” [Italics added for emphasis.]
Ironically, approximately two hours later on the show after an interview with Geraldo, Brian extolled Geraldo’s book as “excellent.” Immediately prior thereto, Geraldo had said that the motif of his book was how Republicans had turned off Hipanics, who naturally would have been Republicans, by “emphasizing the worst aspects of the immigration debate. In making his point, Geraldo explained how George W. Bush had proved to be the exception in his success with Latinos in the 2004 presidential campaign (winning 44% of their vote): He declared, “Because he [Bush] was a former border-state governor, he understood that you have to talk nice about people. You don’t disparage them with slanderous generalizations and stereotypes.”
Geraldo’s lesson learned? Hopefully, so.
Carpe Diem 