Ana Navarro said Friday that Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones should be called to account for his appearance in a 1957 photo of a desegregation protest.
Jones, who was 14 years old at the time the photo was taken outside North Little Rock High School, can be seen standing in the crowd as a group of white students appeared to be blocking several black students from entering the building. Several reporters and photographers are also visible in the image, speaking to students as the protest goes on.
The photo was published last week by The Washington Post in an article attacking Jones for failing to do enough to end racial disparities within the NFL — and Navarro called on Jones to answer for it.
WATCH:
Ana Navarro hijacks the Kanye discussion to shift focus to Cowboys owner Jerry Jones (80) and a picture of him at 14 standing near a racial incident. She demands accountability.
Racist Sunny agrees and whines that blacks are held more to account for racial comments than whites. pic.twitter.com/LnAY1B3g2O— Nicholas Fondacaro (@NickFondacaro) December 2, 2022
The conversation during Friday’s broadcast began around anti-Semitism and recent remarks from rapper Kanye “Ye” West and quickly turned to an attack on billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk and his recent acquisition of Twitter.
“Anti-Semitic posts referring to Jews or Judaism soared more than 81% in the two weeks after Elon Musk acquired Twitter,” Joy Behar alleged without presenting evidence.
Co-host Sunny Hostin agreed, claiming — also without evidence — that attacks against black people and women had also risen in the days since Musk’s purchase was completed.
Navarro pivoted, however, and after only briefly addressing anti-Semitism, turned the attack on Jerry Jones.
Noting that NBA star LeBron James had mentioned the Jerry Jones photo — asking why everyone wanted to talk to him about Kyrie Irving and his anti-Semitic tweets, but no one was asking him about Jones being present at a desegregation protest — Navarro argued that Jones should be doing more to rectify the situation.
“I hope that Jerry Jones, who has so many black players, who has such a platform, who has all this money, who’s got all this access, I hope Jerry jones really does take the opportunity to own this, to talk about it, to explain it, and talk about the change that has happened in 65 years and his role in it,” Navarro challenged.
Hostin noted that Jones had spoken about the photo, saying that he had gone to the front of the school that day to observe and that he was 14 years old at the time.
“I don’t know that I or anybody anticipated or had a background of knowing … what was involved. It was more a curious thing,” Jones said of his presence at the protest.
But then Hostin added that there were also 14-year-olds in the KKK, complaining that people did not get as animated in pushing back against “anti-blackness” as they did against anti-Semitism.