Journalist Geraldo Rivera called conservative commentator Dan Bongino a “son of a b—-” and a “punk” on live TV following a heated altercation about race and the riots that have followed the fatal police shooting of Daunte Wright.
“You just want to see the country burn,” Bongino told Rivera on a segment on Sean Hannity’s show on Wednesday.
“I want to see the country burn, you son of a b—-?,” Rivera responded. “I want to see the country burn, you punk? You’re nothing but a punk. You’re a punk, Bongino. You’re a punk.”
Bongino answered: “Tell me that to my face.”
Geraldo Rivera called Dan Bongino a “son of the bitch” tonight on Hannity after the conservative pundit claimed he “wanted to see the country burn.” pic.twitter.com/D8du1hqB76
— Phillip Nieto (@nieto_phillip) April 15, 2021
The spat began after Bongino insisted that Rivera had “no data” to back up his assertions of racial disparities in policing and that law enforcement does not have a bias problem.
“Yeah, but why does that happen? This is what Geraldo completely misses, he disconnects it,” Bongino said. “Why is that happening, Sean? It’s happening because people like Geraldo continue to pump out a race narrative with no data to back it up at all.”
He continued: “There are hundreds of thousands of police officers and millions of police contacts are with black Americans in the course of each day. If there was a plague of police officers hunting black men down at night, then — I don’t understand — if that’s happening, where is this massive body count?”
Rivera answered, “I just gave you the facts, you only accept facts that you agree with.”
He added: “This man, Sean, is why they have that rage. You tell that to the black families that see their sons being killed twice the rate of white [men]. That’s a fact.”
The feud between the pair appears to have worsened following a similar fight on Hannity on Monday when Bongino accused his counterpart of “inflaming” racial divides.
“You’re just further inflaming the situation, and the country will burn to the ground because of people like you who say dumb things like that with no evidence to back it up,” Bongino said.
The exchange came after Rivera said the death of Wright on Sunday was “horrible” and that “you can’t reach for your Taser and take out your 9mm and shoot somebody and expect everybody to go kumbaya.”
“There’s a situation in this country now where, I swear to God, and I’m speaking with deep experience, too many black mothers are more fearful of the police than they are of crooks when their sons go out. A 20-year-old should not end up dead because of an expired registration,” Rivera said. He added that there is a “gulf between how a regular, white family reacts and how a black family reacts.”
Wright, a 20-year-old black man, was shot during a traffic stop on Sunday. Kim Potter, a white, 26-year veteran of the department who announced her resignation Tuesday, meant to fire her Taser but used her handgun instead, according to former Police Chief Tim Gannon, who resigned shortly after Potter. Wright died after fleeing the scene in his car.
Potter was arrested and charged with second-degree manslaughter on Wednesday. She was released from the Hennepin County Jail after posting a $100,000 bond.
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Brooklyn Center, the city where Wright died, has been roiled by four consecutive nights of unrest as rioters take to the streets, loot businesses and clash with law enforcement.
Less than 10 miles away, the trial of former Minneapolis officer Derek Chauvin, who is accused of killing Georgia Floyd last summer, is taking place. Chauvin has pleaded not guilty to charges of third-degree murder, second-degree murder, and manslaughter.
