Geraldo Rivera literally begged his Fox News colleagues to “understand the anguish in the families of color” who watch the nightly news and, upon seeing the policy brutality, worry that when their child goes out at night, “that child may never come back.”
The topic on Friday night’s “The Five” was the police fatal shooting of 13-year-old Adam Toledo and the disturbing body cam video of police chasing Toledo down an alley and shooting him as he turned around. After Jesse Waters read stats on police who have been killed on duty and Sean Duffy questioned, “Why wasn’t Adam — why wasn’t he in school? Why was he out at 2:00 in the morning? Why did he have a gun? Why was he part of a gang? Where were his parents?,” Rivera spoke up.
“I think Sean makes excellent points and I love cops and I think cops have a very tough job and they risk everything, every time they go to work,” Rivera began. “But I beg you to understand the anguish in the families of color who are watching the news on a nightly basis looking at their child and worrying when that child goes out that that child may never come back, and fearing the cops.”
He pointed out the contrast to other neighborhoods where people look at cops and are relieved when the police show up.
“That’s not the case in many areas in this country,” Rivera said. “And all the protests that you saw last summer — we have emphasized the riots and the looting and condemned them appropriately — but that represents a real reflection of the anguish and rage about police violence that’s out there. When you see this video…and you see the 13-year-old kid with special needs and no father at home, to answer Sean’s point, bleeding from his mouth as his life goes out –.”
Rivera took a breath and continued: “If we, the most respected news organization in the nation, perhaps, don’t recognize the anguish of the people watching the 13-year-old’s life going out of his body, then we don’t deserve the ratings. We don’t deserve it. We have to be sensitive to the way they see life.”