Sen. Tim Scott calls out Don Lemon and others threatened by 'African Americans willing to speak their minds from a conservative perspective'

Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) has been the target of progressive cable news hosts this month. First, there was liberal MSNBC host Joy Reid and then there was CNN's left-wing anchor Don Lemon. The Republican senator fired back at his detractors, who he says are threatened by "African Americans willing to speak their minds from a conservative perspective."

Scott got under the skin of liberals earlier this month during a Fox News appearance where he said, "Woke supremacy is as bad as white supremacy. We need to take that seriously."

Scott advised people who lack "common sense" should read the Bible verse Matthew 5:44, which states, "But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you."

Lemon went on a shrieking rant about Scott's "woke supremacist" comment, and claimed that the senator from South Carolina was "gaslighting" people. Lemon lost his temper and yelled, "Tim Scott! What are you doing?!"

"I've never seen a woke supremacist lynching anybody," Lemon said. "Never saw a woke supremacist denying anybody access to housing or a job or education or voting rights."

"At one point, Lemon was seemingly told not to yell by his producer, but he replied, 'I have to. I know you don't want me to yell, but this is ridiculous,'" Yahoo reported.

On Friday morning, Scott offered a retort to Lemon's blowup.

"I would say that white supremacy and woke supremacy have their roots in racism and discrimination. It is bad. I'm not talking about tomorrow, or yesterday, I'm talking about today. If we don't deal with it today, we are going to have something on our hands that we can't deal with," Scott said on Fox News.

"It was the woke supremacists, by the way, who said that me and Herschel Walker were the coon squad," Scott noted.

"If you watch the folks who are yelling the loudest right now, it includes people who are at their wits' end because there are African Americans willing to speak their minds from a conservative perspective," Scott added. "Why that requires people to threaten my life, to have a security detail because I decide to stand up for my values, my convictions based on my faith, I don't understand that."

Scott addressed Lemon's fit of rage directed toward him, "Don Lemon can say whatever Don Lemon wants to say. Until he has taken a serious look at what's happening on his side of the aisle and come out strong against that, we're going to continue to have a conversation in America that keeps us divided and not building a bridge so that we can live in this nation together."

Earlier this month, Reid went after Scott for the crime of standing during a news conference.

Reid commented on a news conference by Republican lawmakers who were opposed to raising the minimum wage to $15 per hour.

"You've got to love Tim Scott standing there to provide the patina of diversity over that round of words, that basket full of words," Reid said.

While Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) was speaking, Scott and other Republicans stood in the background until it was their time to speak. Scott's press secretary Caroline Anderegg blasted Reid on Twitter. Anderegg pointed out that the senator is not a "prop," and she shared a video clip of Scott speaking at the same event.

"Unsurprising someone like Joy would stoop that low — I guess that's what you do in the absence of a substantive policy critique," Anderegg said. "The senator has been leading the fight against the misguided Dem wage hike for weeks."