Don Lemon Rips Into Jeffrey Lord for Describing Trump as “MLK of Health Care”

CNN commentator Jeffrey Lord drew instant outrage on Thursday after he described President Donald Trump as the “Martin Luther King of health care,” while supporting Trump’s reported plan to cut subsidies to the poor in order to force Democrats into negotiating on a health care bill. According to Lord, the two were comparable because they were willing to put “people in the street in harm’s way” to pass legislation.

By evening, the conservative pundit was still defending the outrageous remarks. During a segment with Don Lemon, Lord repeatedly refused to apologize and dismissed Lemon’s claim that the comparison was insulting. Lord even attempted to tell an anecdote about his father losing employment after defending a black waitress, before Lemon swiftly cut him off.

“Don’t take me to some before-the-war crap,” Lemon said. “I want to hear what you’re saying to the coworkers you work with now, Jeffrey. Answer the question now.”

“I want to hear now to the coworkers, to the people of color you work with on this network every single day, who were offended by your remarks.”

Lord responded by claiming, “We don’t judge people by color in this country.”