He Was On Stage With Jasmine - Now Venton Jones Speaks Out

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The Don Lemon Show 19 min 1 speaker 7 chapters transcribed 5 hours ago
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Why did Rep. Venton Jones and Rep. Jasmine Crockett honor Chris Brown despite his abuse history?

Don Lemon 0:00
So listen, folks are wondering why, right? And I'm so glad we have you here because I think this story it's not just black and white, it's nuanced. You can understand why some people have reservations, I'm sure. I don't want to put words in your mouth mouth, but you had a front row seat to this. So please help us understand. How did this happen? Did anyone ever question whether honoring Chris Brown was a good or a bad idea or that might be some fallout from it?
Venton Jones 0:25
Yeah. First and foremost, well, thank you for having me on this morning. And first off, I wanna offer an apology. And I think that this is a very important conversation around domestic violence. And I want to offer my apology to black women, to women, and to anyone who has experienced domestic violence. And really expressed that it was not my intention um to be able to to stoke um the traumas that that that goes into that as well as the the background of this situation. We were here um at the at the request, you know, of the venue to to come in um and to be able to honor um the importance of this evening that was going on. So both Chris Brown and Usher, we were brought in to help and talk to and mobilize voters who need to be engaged right now in this very important election that we have going on in November.
Venton Jones 1:23
And that is the work that we were engaged in. And so little was seen on that clip. Um but there was so much work and kudos to Congresswoman Crockett for for navigating you know those spaces and bringing together entertainers, bringing together politicians to have you know a lot of those critical conversations. And so let me just jump in here because I
Don Lemon 1:42
have a couple questions before we get too far along. So thank you. And look, I just want to put up some of the comments.

What apology did Rep. Jones issue and who was it directed to?

Don Lemon 1:46
Uh we have some of the comments from folks, and the reason we're asking is because there are two sides. What we said with Jasmine Crockett, and this is no shade to Jasmine Crockett, okay? We've been very supportive of Jasmine Crockett on this program. But you know, there's no uh middle. You love her or you hate her. She's like she's a polarizing person. Um, but she's very good at what she does and she gets attention. So you apologize, right? So let let's put up some of the comments, um, Andy. Um this is insulting, uh tone deaf. One uh on the month eve of domestic violence awareness uh month, this is the take question mark, and then it just goes on, right? We have to do better, and these are women and folks who are doing it.
Don Lemon 2:26
And then there's let's play one video response. So we'll just play a little bit of it so you can hear it.
Unknown 2:31
Jasmine Crockett is representative of mainstream black politics overall. Because for some reason y'all can stand next to people like Chris Brown, repeat abusers and offenders, violent people. You can stand next to folks like that. You can stand next to and uphold the actions of the state of Israel and Benjamin Netanyahu. You can make excuses for billionaires as you take all of their money into their campaign coffers. Because hopefully one day you aspire to be just like one of them, oppressing us. Okay. So that is
Don Lemon 3:02
that's just a sort of a sample of that. Now let me just um let me say this. Uh we need to keep our eyes on the on the ball here because uh you know, there are bigger things to deal with than uh this. But look, this is in the zeitgeist right now. So you apologize. Do you think that I know you can't speak for her, do you think that the Congresswoman should apologize or anyone else who was up on that stage? Was it just you two?
Venton Jones 3:24
Um, well I'm definitely not here to to speak for the Congresswoman and I can only take responsibility for my actions and the actions of my legislative office. So I would I would definitely not want to engage in trying to make any assumptions about anyone else's actions. That's fair. So why did you choose to apologize? Because I think it it's important that as elected officials that we listen to our constituents. And I've spent the last couple of days listening to the feedback that has been shared about this experience.

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