‘Was That Hurtful To You?’ CNN’s Chris Wallace Asks Priyanka Chopra Jonas About ‘Racism’ From NFL Fans Over Her Song

CNN anchor Chris Wallace asked international superstar Priyanka Chopra Jonas about the racist reactions to her opening NFL Network Thursday night football song.

This week’s episodes of Wallace’s HBO Max/CNN series Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace featured interviews with Priyanka and Assistant House Democratic Leader Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina.

In his interview with the internationally-acclaimed Priyanka, Wallace asked about some ugly reactions to her NFL Network theme song:

WALLACE: So you talk briefly about you were going to be a pop star. We even explored that. (Oh come on, stop it Chris) It’s not so bad Priyanka. Okay, so you had a song that for a while was the opening song on NFL Network Thursday night football. Here you are.

[CLIP]

CHOPRA JONAS: I was so young.

WALLACE: Is that what you do? You look back at her and think… like 10 years ago or something?

CHOPRA JONAS: That was like 10 years ago or something. She’s like…I was 30 or something, that’s crazy.

WALLACE: So I heard that that the reaction in social media was not…I mean, yes, there were, obviously people liked it. But there was also a lot of racism, was that true?

CHOPRA JONAS: Well yeah, I mean, NFL Network got a lot of tweets and stuff. Or, you know, things saying, Who’s she? Who’s this person? And why should she be on American TV and like, football should be an American person, it was just like, very confusing, because I’m, I was just an artist with a song that they liked. But props to NFL they double down for next year.

WALLACE: Was that hurtful to you, or by that point, had you sort of been through that and it didn’t, didn’t hit you?

CHOPRA JONAS: No, it hits you every time. It hits you. All of it hits, criticism, the fact that, you know, my job requires me to be dissected, and you know, microscopely. Everything I say, my home, my family, everything is looked at. But that’s the nature of the beast. And I’ve done it for 23 years now. What I’m not expecting is nature to change. You’ve got to start protecting yourself. And I started doing that many years ago. So yes, of course, it was hurtful. But I’m someone who does wear blinders. I’m not…and I believe in, you know, letting my work speak for itself. And the best shut down to people like that, who said that I didn’t belong is to belong. And today, I have, you know, the number one series in the world on the show. And I’m sitting here talking to Chris Wallace, so who won?

WALLACE: Man, it doesn’t get better than that. (Who won?)

Watch above via Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace. The full interviews are available on HBO Max.

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