Co-Host on ‘The View’ Slams Meadows for ‘Black Friend’ Strategy at Cohen Hearing

Conservative co-host Abby Huntsman of “The View” on ABC jumped on the liberal bandwagon on Thursday when she bashed Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) for bringing black Trump administration official Lynne Patton to Michael Cohen’s live congressional hearing.

Cohen, the disgraced former lawyer who found himself in special counsel Robert Mueller’s crosshairs, testified publicly before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on Wednesday.

During her questioning of Cohen, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) made known her feelings about Meadows’ guest. Patton is a longtime Trump Organization employee who now serves as a Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) staffer.

Meadows (pictured above right) vehemently protested the charges of racism against the president and pointed to Patton as an example of African-Americans who are thriving in Trump’s administration and businesses.

But Tlaib derailed the Cohen hearing when she accused Meadows of committing “a racist act” by bringing Patton in as a “prop” to defend Trump.

An outraged Meadows fired back and demanded that that portion of her statement be stricken from the record. He also said “it’s racist to suggest” that he asked Patton to come as a “prop.” Although Tlaib insisted she didn’t call Meadows a “racist” and just wanted to call out his “racist” act, she and Meadows reportedly made up the following day on the House floor.

Still, many liberals and mainstream media members defended Tlaib’s accusations of racist behavior and piled on to Meadows — including Huntsman (above left).

“You don’t have to be black to watch what happened yesterday and feel totally uncomfortable with that moment,” Huntsman said. “It was not the time and place for that.”

Meadows basically used Patton to say, “This is my black friend,” Huntsman claimed.

“All you have to do is call your friends beforehand and say, ‘Does this sound like a good idea to you?'” Huntsman added. “Mark my words, if you do have black friends — and I do, and we have great conversations — not one would tell you, ‘Go have a black person stand up behind you and make that point.'”

Related: Tlaib Doubles Down on Calling Out Meadows for ‘Racist’ Act

Co-host Sunny Hostin also ripped Meadows and defended Tlaib. “I really applauded Congresswoman Tlaib for saying that because when I saw Rep. Meadows use Lynne Patton as a prop for trying to prove that President Trump somehow was not racist, it reinforced that racial trope,” she said.

She accused Meadows of “crying” by asking for Tlaib’s comments to be stricken from the record. Hostin also didn’t buy the congressman’s explanation that he was offended by the accusation of racism because he has relatives who are people of color.

“Slave owners also had black relatives in their family after raping their slaves,” Hostin said. “I was very surprised that Lynne Patton allowed herself to be used as that prop.”

“I was never there to represent my entire race. I was there to represent one man — one man, by the way, who has done more for the black community than the last, probably, three presidents combined.”

But Patton insisted she was not a “prop” and defended her appearance at the Cohen hearing during an interview Thursday night on Fox News’ “The Ingraham Angle.”

“Well, you know, Laura, for me, the only prop in that room … was Michael Cohen for the Democratic Party,” Patton said. “I was never there to represent my entire race. I was there to represent one man — one man, by the way, who has done more for the black community than the last, probably, three presidents combined.”

Ingraham pointed to comments made Wednesday on MSNBC’s “All In” show, in which Danielle Moodie-Mills said Patton was standing like a slave on “an auction block.”

“It’s really actually kind of sad and pathetic,” Patton said of that remark. “The only race card that was played in that room were the folks on the House Democrat committee that basically are taking the word of a self-confessed perjurer and criminally convicted white man over the word and testimony, basically, and experience of a highly educated black woman who rose up through the ranks of one of the most competitive real estate companies in the world … and now works for one of the most successful administrations in history.”

Meadows also appeared on “The Ingraham Angle” separately on Thursday night. He said on the Fox News program of reconciling with Tlaib after she accused him of being racist, “I went down today — listen, we are all about being civil.  She offered an apology … Listen, we are in a civil society. That’s what separates us from all other nations is a civil society. And I just felt compelled to go down and offer a hand of friendship and say, Listen, if there was anything that I did that personally offended you, it didn’t come from my heart. She hugged me, and certainly we looked at moving forward to hopefully work [together] … Fortunately for me, I know that I’m not a racist … We all say hurtful things. And so it’s more important that we reconcile.”

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