‘They All But Used the Word Uppity’: Kirsten Powers Torches Fox for Attacking Meghan Markle as ‘Entitled,’ Playing the ‘Race Card’
USA Today columnist Kirsten Powers pulled few punches in calling out what she saw as the racist undertone of the numerous attacks on Meghan Markle coming from Fox.
During a segment on CNN Tonight with Don Lemon on Tuesday night, Powers offered her take in reaction to a series of archly dismissive clips about Markle’s bombshell interview from Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo, Ainsely Earnhardt on Fox & Friends, and Fox News contributor Joe Concha.
- Bartiromo scoffed at Markle for portraying herself as a victim, saying: “She just is saying that she wasn’t getting the support she needed and all of this stuff.”
- Earnhardt asked her morning chat show co-hosts what they had heard about the interview and then swiftly answered her own question: “I was hearing ‘Cry me a river.’ She was a princess living in a castle and she didn’t want a part of that.”
- And Concha blasted Markle as a kind of anti-role model that he hoped his own daughter would grow up to be the opposite of, saying: “I’m hoping I can mold her to be everything that Meghan Markle is not. In other words, entitled. She is a chronic complainer, Markle is. She plays the race card from the bottom of the deck it appears as well.”
Lemon segued into discussing the Fox supercut with Powers, asking: “Why is the Prince Harry and Meghan Markle story so triggering because usually the right claims ‘Stick it to the elites, right?’ And in this case it seems to be siding with the British monarchy. What?”
“What happened to the Tea Party?” Powers agreed, answering with her own rhetorical question. “This country, by the way, was founded in opposition to the people — to the monarchy which they are the biggest defenders of and they’re so worried about the queen and Prince Phillip and all these other things.”
“I think it goes beyond the fact that republicans benefit from it politically,” Powers added, before linking the Fox attacks to a well-known code word used to denigrate African Americans. “I think that they are very offended by the idea that Meghan Markle, a black woman is not grateful, she’s supposed to be grateful, Don, and she is like — and they all but use the word uppity in the clip that we just listened to, right? So how dare she complain. She should just sit there and be quiet and be thankful that these people let her in their family.”
“They have constructed this whole ridiculous narrative that somehow money or privilege can protect you from racism,” Powers, herself a former Fox News contributor, concluded of the critics. “It is utter — I’m not going to say the word, but it is not true. That’s not how things work. It does not protect you. No amount of privilege will protect you from racism.”
“I’ll give you some letters,” Lemon said jumping in, alluding to her unfinished utterance, “B.S., does that qualify?”
“Yes,” Powers affirmed.
Watch the video above, via CNN.
