Fox News' Megyn Kelly defends 'white Santa' remark: 'Why is white skin alienating?'

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Fox News’ Megyn Kelly defended her controversial ‘white Santa’ comments, saying that she and the network are targets for critics.

Earlier this week, Kelly generated outrage when she discussed the topic of Santa’s race on The Kelly File.

The segment was in response to an article written by Aisha Harris for Slate. In Harris’ piece, she notes the confusion she had as a young African-American girl with the mainstream white Santa and the brown Santa her family celebrated in their home.

While discussing the Slate article, Kelly insisted that Santa was white and that “Jesus was a white man, too. He was a historical figure. That’s a verifiable fact.”

In defense of what she called a “jest” about Santa’s race, Kelly said:

I acknowledged — as Harris did — that the most commonly depicted image of Santa does in fact have white skin. By the way I also did say Jesus was white. As I learned in the last two days, that is far from settled. For me, the fact that an offhand jest I made during a segment about whether Santa should be replaced by a penguin has now become a national firestorm says two things. Race is still an incredibly volatile issue in this country, and Fox News, and yours truly are big targets for many people.

Following those comments, Kelly invited theGrio’s Zerlina Maxwell to discuss the ‘white Santa’ controversy.

During the conversation, Maxwell agreed with Harris’ stance, saying that a white Santa is alienating to black children.

“Why?” Kelly responded. “Why is white skin alienating? And why is that not racist?”

Follow Carrie Healey on Twitter @CarrieHeals.