He's lying, unfortunately. The field this time around is untenable. I am very disappointed.
If you listen to it closely, he says something unintelligible in a sentence full of clearly spoken words. If this was true that the media had him saying "black", they would be pummeling him daily on it. They have nothing, so the story fell apart that day. There are also no episodes in his 20 year career where Rick dabbled in race politics. This story doesn't hold water.