ABC’s George Stephanopoulos called out Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL) for claiming that race doesn’t matter then using racial slurs against Vice President Harris.
Video:
George Stephanopoulos doesn’t put up with Rep. Byron Donalds using racial slurs against Kamala Harris, “Why do you, why do you insist on questioning her racial identity?”
Donalds: You want me to talk?
Stephanopoulos: I want you to answer my question pic.twitter.com/VT3s1HkxCaâ Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) August 4, 2024
Transcript via ABC’s This Week:
STEPHANOPOULOS: And you – and you just repeated the slur again. If it doesn’t matter, why do you all keep questioning her identity? She’s always identified as a black woman. She is biracial. She has a Jamaican father and an Indian mother. She’s always identified as both. Why are you questioning that?
DONALDS: Well, George, first of all, this is something that’s actually a conversation throughout social media right now. There were a lot of people who were trying to figure this out. But again, that’s a side issue, not the main issue. The main issue that’s (INAUDIBLE) – Kamala Harris is the vice president of the United States.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Sir, one second. So, you just did it – you just did it again.
DONALDS: George, (INAUDIBLE) for what (INAUDIBLE) –
STEPHANOPOULOS: Why – why do you – why do you insist on questioning her racial identity?
DONALDS: You want to talk or do you want me to talk?
STEPHANOPOULOS: I – I want you to answer my question.
DONALDS: OK, you don’t yelling at – George – George, now that you’re done yelling at me, let me answer.
He talked about it on the stage yesterday in Atlanta for, what, two minutes? He spent more than 35, 40 minutes going after her record, talking about how radical of a senator that she was. She was the most liberal senator in the United States – in the United States Senate. That is a fact. He talked about the job that she did as vice president of the United States. A job, I will add, which has been a failure for the American people. I know you guys like to glom on to this, that he talks about in jest or in a serious manner for about a minute or so. What you do not cover is the litany of failures of Kamala Harris. That’s what you’re not covering, George.
STEPHANOPOULOS: So, question – so questioning somebody’s racial identity for a couple of minutes is OK?
DONALDS: George, I’m going to tell you again, he brought it up. AP is the one that wrote the headline when she first came into the United States Senate. Didn’t talk about her being black. Talked about her being the first Indian American senator. AP brought that up.
I mean, George, we could have this conversation for the entire segment, but none of this matters to the American people. What matters to the American people is, are we going to have the same policies of the Biden-Harris administration that has been destructive of the American people? Or are we going to have the policies of the Trump administration which put America first, had low inflation, prosperous Americans no matter your race, no matter your color, no matter your creed, and a foreign policy that kept America safe?
Those are the facts that truly matter because this issue is going to come and go, the lives of the American people is what’s going to remain and that’s what matters more than anything else.
STEPHANOPOULOS: If it doesn’t matter, I don’t understand why you keep on repeating it, why the president keeps on repeating it, why those introducing the president yesterday keep on repeating it.
Republicans are using part of the same strategy that they used against Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 against Kamala Harris in 2024. The strategy is to claim to diminish the slur while repeating it over and over again.
Times have changed and hosts like George Stephanopoulos are not going to turn a blind eye to what Republicans are doing.
Donalds was clearly attempting to smear Harris, and his attack was by design. The Trump campaign is using Donalds to try to slow down the Harris surge with black voters.
Republicans should be trying to win the election on issues not slurs, and George Stephanopoulos did the right thing by calling out what Donalds was doing.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
