Just weeks after a similar incident last month, C-SPAN host Pedro Echevarria was forced to cut off a racist caller during his Washington Journal call-in show this week.
The incident happened during a discussion of the mass shooting in Buffalo, New York over the weekend, which appears to have been a hate crime targeting Black people by a White gunmen who wrote a shockingly racist manifesto in advance of the shooting.
The caller—a self-identified Republican named John—went on a rant because Echevarria would not indulge his repeated change of subject to other recent shootings that involved gunmen who were not White.
The rant escalated to a profane accusation of racism on Echevarria's part and he was forced to hang up on the caller.
See the moment below.
John's call into the show went sideways practically from the very beginning. He started by insulting Echevarria and his show.
"It's stir-the-pot Sunday. Baby CNN here trying to get everybody to hate each other on a Sunday."
John then began a rant on so-called "Black on Black crime," a common talking-point among conservatives.
"Like the first caller—he thinks White people are systematically out hunting Black people."
"I guess he doesn't watch channel 6 news in Philadephia, where Blacks kill Blacks three, four in the middle of the afternoon."
When Echevarria tried to redirect John back to the topic at hand by asking him what he thinks of the Buffalo shooting, the man became even more agitated.
"I don't think nothing of it!"
"Because I think you're just trying to start a race war."
He then began ranting about two recent killings involving non-white assailants: the attack in Waukesha, Wisconsin in which a Black man drove his car into a parade, and last month's New York City subway shooting perpetrated by a Black gunman.
When John expressed outrage that these incidents were not considered race crimes, Echevarria once again attempted to get John back on-topic.
He then exploded in anger, calling the New York city subway shooter a racist who was hunting White people.
"How does it relate?"
"He is a racist!"
"He went from Philadelphia to New York just to kill White people on a subway."
When Echevarria refused to indulge John's repeated redirection of the conversation and yet again asked him how these incidents are relevant to the Buffalo shooting, John erupted, exclaiming:
"You're a goddamn racist!"
Echevarria quickly cut him off to inform him he can't use foul language on-air and then hung up on him.
On Twitter, John's unhinged rant left some people shocked.
This incident comes just weeks after Echevarria was forced to hang up on another Republican caller for calling Black people "colored" on-air.
