Don Lemon Accuses Stephen A. Smith of ‘Cozying Up to White People’ with Take on ICE Shooting

Former CNN host Don Lemon feels that the only rationale for Stephen A. Smith’s defense of the ICE agent who shot Renee Good is that he is trying to “cozy up to white people.”

Lemon, who apparently has never watched ESPN if he thinks that cozying up to white people happens there, accused Smith of calling the shooting “justified” as a ploy to get “money.”

“I try not to criticize, especially Black men, or just Black people in general, you know, because we get so much sh*t. The rules are different for us,” Lemon began. “But Stephen A. Smith goes off and talks about sh*t that he has no idea about.”

Lemon continued, “He just gets on these like White boy, right-wing podcasts or his own show and just goes off about Black people and things that for which he has no clue.”

The former CNN host added, “It’s just shocking to me, this sort of cozying up to White people. And it’s gotta be for the money.”

Lemon then mused about how much money he could make as a black conservative journalist.

“If I became a Black conservative, I would be richhhhh!” Lemon exclaimed. “Like a gazillionaire.”

Stephen A. Smith is richly compensated, for sure. Though his eight-figure contract is owed to his sports hot-takes, not so much his talking politics.

Lemon’s criticism of Smith stems from the ESPN talker’s comments earlier in the week when he called the actions of the ICE agent who shot and killed anti-ICE protester Renee Good, “completely justified.”

However, Smith also said the officer could have shot Good’s tires instead of shooting her.

“I saw the video on numerous occasions and, seeing what transpired, from a lawful perspective as it pertains to a law enforcement official, don’t expect him to be prosecuted,” Smith explained. “He was completely justified. From a humanitarian perspective, however, why did you have to do that? If you could move out the way, that means you could have shot the tires. That means you could have got her a few feet away after you shot the tires; and if you were unsuccessful in doing that, you could have got her down the road. You didn’t have to do that. She wasn’t driving down the road, coming at you 90 miles an hour. She was parked in the middle of the street, and rather than get out the car, she wrongfully tried to drive off and wrongfully disregarded law enforcement official — which is exactly what ICE is — and as a result, lost her life because of it.”

Lemon continued his scathing criticism of the ESPN talker by saying that Smith’s “stock and trade” had moved from sports to bashing black people.

Both Good and the ICE officer who shot her, are white. So it’s unclear why he sees the issue as racial. Nor is Smith ingratiating himself with his ESPN colleagues by defending ICE officers, since the overwhelming majority of them are liberal.

Then again, making sense was never Lemon’s strong suit.