Ferguson Decision: Don Lemon And Van Jones Argue On CNN Over Protests [Video]
Don Lemon and Van Jones of CNN sharply disagreed today over the precise nature of the Ferguson, Missouri protests following the news that a grand jury declined to indict Officer Darren Wilson for the shooting of Michael Brown.
Jones, a former Obama administration official, even deemed Lemon’s commentary “an insult” to the citizens who took to the streets of the St. Louis suburb last night
As the Inquisitr previously reported, both men, along with Chris Cuomo, were hit with tear gas during riots that broke out after the announcement of the grand jury decision. One disgruntled protester even dropped an F-bomb during one of Lemon’s live shots.
The CNN anchor recently made headlines with a strange question to one of Bill Cosby’s rape accusers. Lemon has also taken heat on social media on several occasions on certain matters, particularly insofar as the black community is concerned.
In a stand-up today with Cuomo, Jones, and legal commentator Sunny Hostin (see embed below), Lemon appeared to be initially speaking approvingly of certain of Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s prior comments about the role of law enforcement in Ferguson when he said the following:
“In my estimation there’s been too much political correctness, trying to appease protesters. I don’t mean appease the people out there peacefully. There was nothing peaceful about last night. It was hard to be peaceful that crowd… I think there needs to be a stronger hand in people marauding the streets and people having the potential of setting fires… and the potential of harming people… It doesn’t matter what color someone who is marauding or looting is. If they’re black, white, purple, or green … you need to be arrested, you need to be held accountable.”
Van Jones saw things quite differently.
“The vast, vast majority of people out there at the very beginning were trying to be peaceful,” he said. “Then you saw way down the street… a bunch of knuckleheads start a bunch of nonsense. Then [the police] started bombarding with tear gas. Most of the people who were out there for good reasons started to leave in large numbers … the small number of people who were left were either social bloggers and videographers or people who out there trying to start trouble.”
Lemon countered, “How do you know who’s peaceful in a crowd of people who are racing toward you? How do police know whether it’s water or urine or [a] Molotov cocktail in a bottle when people say ‘why are they getting upset, why are they arresting people?'”
Watch the entire Don Lemon, Van Jones heated exchange about Ferguson and draw your own conclusions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brhy8iF7Qjs
[top image credit: Neon Tommy]
