Jemele Hill can’t believe Stephen A. Smith would agree to have dinner with President Donald Trump.
On the Tuesday episode of her Spolitics podcast, Hill excoriated Smith for his choice to join Kid Rock and Bill Maher for a dinner with the president last week. After receiving backlash, Smith pointed out that his objective was to discuss HBCUs, but it appears that isn’t good enough for some.
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“Now, I am of the opinion that sitting down with people who are politically opposite of you is totally fine if there is some common ground to be reached. A beautiful thing. But both parties have to come into it with a certain intention, with a certain level of honesty, to be able to say, ‘I’m going into this meeting or into this conversation with the thought that I kind of want my mind changed.’ You have to adopt that mentality,” Hill explained. “There is nothing about Donald Trump that suggests that he is in that frame of mind. He’s stubborn, he’s bullish, and most importantly, he rarely shows displays of compassion. He’s not a compassionate person, so trying to appeal to his sensibility and appeal to his compassion, to me, is a dummy mission. Not that the person doing it is a dummy, but it is a dummy mission, meaning, what’s the point?”
She pointed out that Trump and Smith had beef previously, arguing that this was a good reason for Smith to decline any sort of invitation.
“And oh, by the way, ain’t this the same dude that basically called you stupid? He called you stupid! He told America you were stupid and low IQ. Gotta say, when I think about dinner companionship, the last person I want to have dinner with is someone who called me stupid to the world — not just in a private conversation where we’re arguing, but told the whole world I’m stupid. They’re not going to be on my priority list. But hey, if you like it, I love it,” she snarked.
Indeed, Trump did hit back after Smith criticized his decision to attend Game 3 of the NBA Finals in June.
“He’s coming to Game 3 of the Finals, and I don’t want him there. He’s coming to Game 4 of the NBA Finals, and I don’t want him there. It has nothing to do with politics, policy, or anything like that,” he said. “It has everything to do with him disrupting and contributing at the same time to the chaos that’s going to be existing at Madison Square Garden. If it were Barack Obama coming to the Garden, I would say, ‘Stay home.’ Stay at the White House.’”
Trump fired back, calling him “dumb as a rock” and a “low IQ individual” in a Truth Social post days later.
“Stephen A. Smith is an arrogant fool, a low IQ individual. In other words, he’s ‘dumb as a rock,’ and totally unqualified to ever think of running for high political office, or even low political office, for that matter! He’d get annihilated in a debate by the most incompetent of politicians. Joe Biden’s now ‘fabled’ performance would look great by comparison to anything that this loudmouth huckster has to offer, which isn’t much! Within a few weeks, they’d laugh him out of politics!!!” Trump wrote.
