George Floyd protests: Piers Morgan calls Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani ‘mad’ as they spar on TV over president’s tweet

The former New York mayor clashed with the presenter as they traded insults on TV show ‘Good Morning Britain’

The pair argued over Trump’s ‘when the looting starts, the shooting starts’ tweet, which was flagged by Twitter for glorifying violence

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Rudy Giuliani (L) with US President Donald Trump. Photo: EPA-EFE

Published: 11:08pm, 4 Jun 2020Updated: 12:01am, 5 Jun 2020

Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, was called “mad” and “unhinged” during an explosive interview on British television on Thursday, as he defended the US President’s handling of the George Floyd protests.

The former New York mayor clashed with presenter Piers Morgan, who once hosted a chat show on CNN, calling him a “failed journalist”, as they traded insults in a live broadcast.

The pair argued specifically over Trump’s May 29 tweet, later flagged by Twitter for glorifying violence, that “when the looting starts, the shooting starts”, following early protests over Floyd’s death in police custody.

Floyd, an unarmed African-American, died on May 25 after white Minnesota police officer Derek Chauvin was filmed kneeling on his neck for nearly nine minutes. The incident sparked outrage, and widespread protests across the United States and beyond, exposing once again the deep faultlines of race and inequality.

Morgan, a former tabloid newspaper editor, said the president should never have tweeted the remark, originally heard during the racially charged 1960s civil rights era in the US.

Donald Trump's lawyer and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani is interviewed by Piers Morgan (not pictured) on