Don Lemon is "serious" about possible 2028 run: "I would be a really good president"

Out former CNN anchor Don Lemon says he’s “serious” about a possible presidential bid and claimed that”people keep asking me if I’m running for president” in a podcast episode that was released yesterday.

“I don’t know, I might, I’m serious,” he said on the Can’t Be Censored podcast. “I might because people keep asking me to do it or if I’m going to do it.

“I look around, and I see the, you know, the folks who are possibly in the running, and some of them are impressive, many of them- most of them are not,” he continued. “And it seems in this day and age you don’t have to have a ton of political experience because our current president has none, had none, that’s very obvious.”

Lemon worked for CNN as a journalist from 2006 to 2023, when he was fired after several gaffes and accusations of sexist behavior, including saying former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) wasn’t “in her prime.”

“Sorry,” he said. “A woman is considered to be in her prime in her 20s and 30s and maybe 40s.” He later apologized, but CNN fired him three years before his contract was set to expire.

Since then, he has been working as an independent journalist, publishing videos online. Earlier this year, he was arrested for livestreaming an anti-ICE protest in St Paul, Minnesota.

This isn’t the first time he has discussed presidential ambitions, saying on an April episode of Pod Save America that he “might” run for president.

“Why not? I’m not saying that I’m going to do it, but why not?” Lemon said at the time. “My parents taught me growing up that I could be anything that I wanted. And so, if Donald Trump can be president, why can’t I be president? So, I might do it. Who knows?”

And apparently those thoughts weren’t a one-off, as he said this week, “I actually think I would be a really good president of the United States. I’m being totally serious.”

He then said that he would “like to run” a presidential campaign that doesn’t involve campaign donors but is instead “voter/citizen driven” and that he would rather not take donations.

“I would rather the people of the United States say, ‘That’s the guy we want,’ and give five or 10 dollars – something that doesn’t break the bank,” he said. This is common campaign rhetoric, especially among Democrats, who often claim that their campaigns are driven by small donations from people without a stake in any industry.

He said that he has “talked to people about it, people who have been in politics before, what would it take, when would I have to get in to do it, and I’d have to be really serious about it. And then they tell me, ‘You can’t tell these types of stories during dinner parties if you want to be president of the United States!’ Because I like to have fun and I have a potty mouth.”

Lemon then claimed that the only thing holding him back is the publicity that comes with a presidential run, which he said would “ruin my life.”

He stressed that he has not made a decision.