Spurred on by Roseanne Barr’s racist remarks today, CNN host Don Lemon said the actor’s comments are just one part of the much larger issue of racism in America — an issue that he believes is getting worse because of President Donald Trump who is “emboldening” bigots and bigotry.

Lemon began the segment by pointing to some of Barr’s many controversial statements in the past and suggesting these new comments from her — in which she compared Valerie Jarrett to an ape — are nothing new. He then moved on from Barr, who was fired from ABC for her racist tweetstorm this morning, and tied the controversy to Trump and his supporters in a fiery monologue:

“We know what Donald Trump thinks. We know what Roseanne Barr thinks. It’s time for us to stop playing around with soft words by saying, ‘Oh, well they’re saying insensitive things.’ No, it’s racist! They’re exhibiting racist behavior. And far too many of our fellow American citizens agree with them. And feel emboldened to say out loud the things they wouldn’t have dared to say in public just a few years ago. In an America where racism happens every day, in our neighborhoods, in our workplaces, in our schools, in a Starbucks, in a park, at an Airbnb, what is America going to do about it?”

He continued by asking viewers to “stop pretending” that individual examples of racism are just isolated incidents, and added, “We have to stop pretending that this president has nothing to do with it, that he’s not emboldening racists and racism and giving them a platform and making it okay.”

“We have to stop pretending that or we’re going to destroy the moral fabric of this country,” he concluded.

As for Barr’s comments, she was fired from her hit ABC series Roseanne today after tweeting an anti-Semitic conspiracy and saying, “muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj” — which a refernce to the former Obama aide Valerie Jarrett, who is a person of color.

Watch above, via CNN.

[image via screengrab]

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