Megyn Kelly going after successful Black women online is nothing new: Meghan Markle, Naomi Osaka and even Beyoncé are among her past targets. Now, Emmy award-winning journalist Jemele Hill is the latest. But the former ESPN personality is not letting Kelly get the last word.
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Kelly fired the first shot when she played a clip on her show of Hill talking about the “angry discourse” that has come from the right criticizing Democrats since Charlie Kirk’s killing. But rather than focusing on Hill’s words, Kelly chose to hurl insults at her that were focused on her looks.
“First of all, a coat of mascara would be your friend,” she said. “You need a little work, and you should have them back off the camera a little bit because you are not attractive enough to have that extreme close-up. Push away your laptop, Jemele, and add a filter or two.”
Hill wasted no time clapping back at Kelly in a Sept. 16 livestream, (after giving her an extreme close-up, of course). In the video, Hill said that when she has a disagreement with another woman in the public eye, she makes a point of not criticizing their looks because she is aware of the double standard placed on women who are judged more by how they look than their job performance.
“Generally, when I attack somebody for their words, their ideas, especially dealing with women on TV, I never say s*t about their looks. And the reason I don’t say anything about their looks is because this is something that women in television often have to deal with,” she said.
She continued to defend herself saying that while she has no shade for people who wear makeup, she’s someone who has no problem presenting herself without coats of foundation and eyeliner.
“I’m proud to come on live and present myself as I am in my natural state because I’m not ashamed of what I look like,” she said. “Your advice to me is to get some mascara. My advice to you is to get a personality and a persona that doesn’t always make you look like a racist and a bigot and trash.”
Hill went on to call Kelly out for racist comments she’s made in the past, including the idea that Santa Claus can only be white and that blackface is acceptable. She ended her read with a few words of warning for the former Fox News personality, telling her to keep the personal insults out of the conversation.
“Me and you ain’t the same, girl,” she said. “You may not like my opinions. I get called names all the time, but what you not gone do is call me ugly, because this face card ain’t never been declined.”
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