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Jay-Z Reacts To Donald Trump's 'Shithole' Comments During Interview With Van Jones

Hov also spoke about racism in America, politics, and more.

Everytime Jay-Z does an interview it’s a treat because he imparts so much knowledge and game every time he’s asked the right questions.

CNN’s Van Jones knows a little something about Hip Hop culture (and doing good interviews) so it was perfect that Hov was able to make an appearance on his show.

Fresh off his Roc Nation brunch, Jay, since it was CNN carrying the interview, was asked a lot about current events, including Donald Trump’s recent “shithole” comments in reference to El Salvador, Haiti and, essentially, the entire continent of Africa.

The rap mogul says the comments were “hurtful” and “misinformed.”

"Everyone feels anger, but after the anger it's really hurtful because he's looking down on a whole population of people and he's so misinformed because these places have beautiful people," he said. Interestingly, he pivoted to former L.A. Clippers owner Donald Sterling's racist comments from a few years ago and the fallout that came from that.

"There was a moment when Donald Sterling had been exposed as this racist on a private phone conversation that he was having and they took his team from him," Jay said. "And it's like, OK, that's one way to do it. But another way would have been, let him have his team and then let's talk about it together. ... Maybe some penalties. Because once you do that, all the other closet racists just run back in the hole. You haven't fixed anything. What you've done was spray perfume on a trash can."

When it comes to the #MeToo movement, Hov showed that he definitely pays attention to women’s advancement and said the awareness “had to happen.”

“I believe everything happens for a reason,” he said when asked about the myriad of sexual misconduct allegations recently revealed by the media. “Everything is a learning experience—you know, the good, the bad, the ugly. This had to happen to purge itself… It has to happen. This movement and everything that’s going on and what we're finding out, it's like racism—it existed the whole time. It's almost like we normalized it. It's the normalization of the things we do to survive. For women to go to work knowing this sort of abuse was happening every day; because you can look and logically say, ‘Why would you stay there?’ What’s the alternative? You have to survive in America.”

On Colin Kaepernick, Jay-Z says he’d much rather be in the former 49ers quarterback’s shoes than just another player on the field doing a job.

“Would you rather be playing football, getting your head dinged in, or would you rather be an iconic figure for the rest of your life?” he asked. “We confuse the idea of having a job with fulfilling your purpose.”

No interview is complete without talking about his wife Beyonce. Surprisingly, while we’ve heard Bey’s side of the Lemonade story, Hov hasn’t expanded on it much outside of music. And while he was pretty brief about it, he did offer an interesting tidbit about it.

"For us, we chose to fight for our love. For our family,” he said. “To give our kids a different outcome. To break that cycle for black men and women."

Watch Van Jones’ full interview with Jay-Z below.

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