Geraldo Rivera blasted hip hop music on Tuesday during a sit-down interview to promote his almost-win on NBC's "Celebrity Apprentice."
Rivera, a correspondent for Fox News, contended that rap has been a bigger challenge for certain minorities than racism has in the past decade.
"Hip-hop has done more damage to black and brown people than racism in the last 10 years," Rivera said during a half-hour chat with HuffPost Live (his comments begin at 22:45).
"[Find a] youngster — a Puerto Rican from the South Bronx or a black kid from Harlem who has succeeded in life other than being the one-tenth of one-tenth of one percent that make it in the music business — that's been a success in life walking around with his pants around his ass and with visible tattoos," he said.
Rivera made the unprompted comments when the stream's host Josh Zepps asked about his political views. Rivera then pressed further, calling out mogul Russell Simmons.
"I love Russell Simmons, he's a dear friend of mine. I admire his business acumen," Rivera said, "at some point, those guys have to cop to the fact that by encouraging this distinctive culture that is removed from the mainstream, they have encouraged people to be so different from the mainstream that they can't participate other than, you know, the racks in the garment center and those entry-level jobs."
"I lament it. I really do. I think that it has been very destructive culturally," he concluded.
