Fox Business News host Charles Payne was among those who denounced “#blackbrunch” protesters on Sunday who interrupted white restaurant customers to raise awareness about police brutality.
“Goodness this isn’t what Montgomery Bus Boycott or Woolworth sit-ins were about -this is ignorance #blackbrunchnyc,” he wrote in a tweet that was retweeted over 600 times.
Goodness this isn’t what Montgomery Bus Boycott or Woolworth sit-ins were about -this is ignorance #blackbrunchnyc pic.twitter.com/ewRbXOi1Sx
— Charles V Payne (@cvpayne) January 4, 2015
But the photo Payne shared with his tweet wasn’t an image from Sunday’s protests at all. Instead, it was a racist meme that’s been widely shared on white supremacist websites and other corners of the Internet as far back as 2010.
The original photo, which was published by the Detroit News, shows a crowd rushing through a door to pick up federal housing assistance forms. At some point, a KFC logo was photoshopped onto the glass doors and the caption “Photograph from the opening of a new KFC in Detroit, 2009” was added to the image.
Some Twitter users called Payne out for using such a misleading image, but the Fox host initially defended the photo as “real” even if it wasn’t actually related to the “#blackbrunch” protests:
.@EdAsante77 @ImitationJordan picture is real not from today..focus needs to shift to real internal issues -there is no outside salvation
— Charles V Payne (@cvpayne) January 5, 2015
@kalexandria16 great point but not the point…PS some of today’s photos are actually less buffoonish but more intimidating
— Charles V Payne (@cvpayne) January 5, 2015
The BlackOut Collective, a group that participated in the “#blackbrunch” protests in Oakland, also called Payne out for using a misleading photo:
@cvpayne I love you because you are Cherie’s pops. And we won’t agree about much. But lets agree to fact check pictures and facts.
— BlackOUT Collective (@blackoutcollect) January 5, 2015
Payne’s vague responses didn’t make clear why he thought the KFC meme was relevant to the discussion. When one Twitter user asked him “So with it being a fried chicken place this has to be parody, right?” Payne replied “Oh god I wish…man do I wish it was.”
Payne did not immediately respond to a request for comment from TPM. But he did tweet that he’d address the incorrect photo Monday on his Fox Business Network show, “Making Money.”
posted incorrect picture for #blackbrunchnyc then posted photo from yesterday- I’ll discuss on my show tonight-the actions wrong & misplaced
— Charles V Payne (@cvpayne) January 5, 2015
Curiously, after acknowledging that the KFC image was incorrect, he continued to insist that it depicted a real event and was not photoshopped:
.@QuarlesRobin picture isn’t Photoshop just different event/time -ride train or walk down street if you want to see perpetuating sterotypes
— Charles V Payne (@cvpayne) January 5, 2015
