New Day co-anchor Chris Cuomo says he “was wrong” to compare the term “fake news” to the “N” word.
After Pres. Trump called out Cuomo on Twitter for a segment Thursday, Cuomo called into Michael Smerconish‘s SiriumXM show to talk about it.
“The only thing that’s bothersome about it, is that I see being called ‘fake news’ as the equivalent of the n-word for journalists, the equivalent of calling an Italian any of the ugly words that people have for that ethnicity. That’s what fake news is to a journalist,” Cuomo told Smerconish.
“It is an ugly insult and you better be right if you’re going to charge a journalist with lying on purpose and the president was not right here and he has not been right in the past,” Cuomo added.
Here’s the clip:
Late Thursday afternoon, Cuomo apologized:
I was wrong. Calling a journalist fake -nothing compared to the pain of a racial slur. I should not have said it. I apologize https://t.co/TJGUgWz9Q2
— Christopher C. Cuomo (@ChrisCuomo) February 9, 2017
He even got some support from across the street, from FBN’s Charlie Gasparino (who’s not known for throwing around a lot of compliments on twitter)
for the record, chris is a reporter of high integrity his point: govt is looking to eliminate ALL news coverage thru this cheap label https://t.co/wyT8EjGABy
— Charles Gasparino (@CGasparino) February 9, 2017