Trevor Noah Rips Police For Denying Atlanta Shootings Were a Hate Crime: ‘If That Wasn’t Racism, Then the Word Has No Meaning’

The Daily Show’s Trevor Noah tore into police officials in Georgia who tamped down the notion that the Atlanta spa shootings, which left 6 Asian women and 2 others dead, were a hate crime.

When Cherokee City Sheriff Frank Reynolds spoke to reporters about the attack on Wednesday, he said initial interviews with the suspected shooter indicate that he was driven by a “sexual addiction,” rather than bias. Noah was quite unconvinced, however, as he argued that the racist element of the shooting was abundantly clear.

“First of all, f*ck you man! You killed six Asian people,” Noah said. “If there’s anyone who’s racist, its a motherf*cker who kills 6 Asian women. Your murders speak louder than your words.”

Noah continued to lament that the most painful thing about the shootings is “we saw it coming,” given the recent surge in hate crimes and violence toward Asian Americans. He also slammed those dismissing the “woke” concerns about all this, telling them “if you just apply your mind, you know this is going to happen.”

As Noah spoke about America’s failure to take preventative action whenever mass shootings happen, he turned to the “underlying conditions” for why these things are allowed to transpire.

“But whatever you do,” he said, “don’t tell me this thing had nothing to do with race…You can’t disconnect this violence from the racist stereotypes people attach to Asian women. This guy blamed a specific race of people for his problems, and then murdered them because of it. If that isn’t racism, then the word has no meaning.”

Finally, Noah turned his ire toward Police Captain Jay Baker, who has been heavily criticized for saying the shooting happened because the suspect was having a “really bad day.”

“You see the police officer come out and almost try to humanize the shooter more than the people who got shot,” said Noah. “It’s always interesting who the police try to find the humanity in.”

Watch above, via Comedy Central.