Former CNN star Don Lemon launched a scathing attack on his former boss, describing him as a 'white man who failed upwards' in a nearly 2,000-word essay published on Thursday. The essay, titled 'Don’t Cry For Stephen Colbert. Cry For The First Amendment,' saw the 60-year-old journalist taking aim at white men in positions of power, highlighting what he called a 'problem nobody wanted to name out loud.'
Criticism of White Men in Power
Lemon wrote, 'It is a world that has been extraordinarily good to a very specific kind of person,' referring to CNN head Chris Licht, who fired Lemon in 2023. He added, 'White men who fail spectacularly and are promoted for it. White men who make catastrophic decisions and are handed bigger offices for it.' The essay continued to criticize white men who 'are visibly, demonstrably unqualified and are given more power anyway.'
Personal Experience
Lemon claimed he has watched, managed, and been 'undone' by his white colleagues for thirty years. Although he did not name Licht directly, he provided specific details about Licht's career that made clear the target of his criticism. 'The executive producer who ran The Late Show for years eventually left. And somehow landed in my world,' Lemon wrote. 'That same person, from that same television orbit, eventually became my boss at CNN. And fired me. I won’t name him. I don’t need to.'
Lemon described this as 'one of the most spectacular examples of a white man failing up that I have ever witnessed in the media industry.' He added insults, calling Licht 'profoundly unqualified, visibly incompetent, elevated anyway.'
Reference to His Own Arrest
Lemon briefly mentioned his own arrest in January 2024, when he stormed into a Minnesota church to protest Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) actions. He described the incident as 'covering an anti-ICE protest at Cities Church as an independent journalist.'
Colbert and Free Speech
The essay was published just hours before the final episode of Stephen Colbert's talk show, which was canceled last year. Lemon noted that Colbert's show was losing $40 million to $50 million annually, according to CBS. He called Colbert a 'martyr for free speech' and claimed that talk show hosts like Seth Meyers, Jimmy Kimmel, and Jimmy Fallon are freedom fighters for criticizing President Donald Trump.
Criticism of Republicans
Lemon also took aim at Republicans, writing, 'Republicans love to call themselves free speech absolutists. First Amendment warriors. They say it constantly. They built entire political careers on it.' He added, 'And every time someone says something they don’t like, every time a comedian lands a joke that stings, every time a journalist asks a question they cannot answer, they find a way to make it stop.'
He accused the right of canceling shows, pressuring networks, and arresting journalists at protests. 'They are the biggest snowflakes in American public life, wrapping themselves in the language of free speech while working every day to eliminate it for anyone who disagrees with them,' Lemon wrote.
Lemon urged readers to 'cry' for the First Amendment and noted that he had 'built something' after being fired. At the time of this report, his Substack post had fewer than 400 likes.
