President Donald Trump gave a surprising response on Wednesday to the idea that popular sportscaster Stephen A. Smith run for president. He’d love to see him give the White House a shot. The answer came during an interview with NewsNation. Smith was included in the segment, during which he shot more than a few questions at the president concerning his stance against DEI policies.
“I’ve been pretty good at picking people and picking candidates, and I will tell you I’d love to see him run,” Trump said.
The interview also included former Fox News commentator Bill O’Reilly and former CNN anchor Chris Cuomo. It was O’Reilly who tossed out the idea of Smith running for president, which was likely a joke.
“Stephen A, he’s a good guy. He’s a smart guy. I love watching him,” Trump said in response to O’Reilly’s suggestion. I find Smith to be an acquired taste. Sometimes he’s on it, sometimes he’s not.
“He’s got great entertainment skills, which is very important. People watch him. You know, a lot of these Democrats I watch, I say they have no chance,” the president said, according to the New York Post.
Trump had just fielded questions from Smith, who is black, on a series of actions by his administration to roll back policies intended to benefit racial minorities.
“Your administration has issued executive orders dismantling DEI initiative across federal agencies, including revoking equal opportunity mandates and slashing funding for minority owned businesses,” Smith said to the president during the interview. “Critics argue these actions reverse decades of civil rights progress. So how do you justify these measures, and what message do they send to the marginalized communities?”
Trump responded with pure class by saying, “What we’re doing is we have a country that’s based solely on merit now, and that’s the way it is. If somebody’s out there doing a great job —and this includes getting into colleges if you’ve worked really hard — and we don’t look at race.”
“We don’t look at color, we don’t look at height or shortness or weight. If somebody is doing a good job and they worked and they got great marks, and they got great board numbers, and they get rejected at Harvard, which has been so disgusting, so horribly. I mean, so think of it,” he added.
Smith, known for his sharp tongue and theatrics, has floated the idea of tossing his hat in the ring for president in 2028 on multiple occasions, going so far as to say he might have “no choice” but to do it.
“I have no choice because I’ve had elected officials, and I’m not going to give their names, elected officials coming up to me,” Smith told ABC News’ “This Week” on April 13.
“I’ve had folks that got a lot of money, billionaires and others that have talked to me about exploratory committees and things of that nature,” he added. “I’m not a politician. I’ve never had a desire to be a politician.”
If Trump can run and win, then there’s no reason Smith can’t, aside from having bad policy positions. The idea that you have to have billions of dollars and tons of political experience to become president has been thoroughly destroyed.
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