Valerie Jarrett Calls Roseanne Racist Tweet “Teaching Moment”
May 29, 2018
Valerie Jarrett Calls Roseanne Racist Tweet “Teaching Moment”
Former Obama adviser, previously scheduled to appear on MSNBC’s town hall about racism in America, takes the opportunity to finally weigh in on the racist tweets Roseanne Barr sent out about her earlier in the day.
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Every early Tuesday morning Barr had tweeted comparing Jarrett to an ape, as Barr had done in 2013 in a tweet comparing another Trump administration official, Susan Rice to an ape. After this morning’s tweet, ABC canceling Roseanne’s sitcom, saying the that and other morning racist,anti-semitic tweets from Barr, were not in keeping with ABC’s values.
“We have to turn it into a teaching moment,” Jarrett said. “I’m fine. I’m worried about all the people out there who don’t have a circle of friends and followers who come right to their defense.”
That includes, she said, “the person who’s walking down the street, minding their own business, and they see somebody cling to their purse or want to cross the street. Or, every black parent I know who has a boy who has to sit down and have a conversation––The Talk, as we call it. As you say, those ordinary examples of racism that happen every single day.”