Geraldo Rivera said President Trump should've told reality star and former aide Omarosa Manigault Newman "you're fired" much earlier than her eventual departure.

Chief of Staff John Kelly fired Omarosa 11 months into the Trump administration -- an event the Ohio native has come under intense fire for recording surreptitiously in the Situation Room.

Rivera said Trump "always had an affinity and affection for people," including the "flamboyant and charismatic" Omarosa.

Rivera, who appeared on Trump's "The Apprentice" as Omarosa had, said she was his most "vivid contestant."

But, he questioned Trump's judgment in hiring the three-time contestant and onetime aide to former Vice President Al Gore (D-Tenn.) for a White House job.

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"He should've said 'you're fired' and kept her out of the... White House," he said. "Obviously, her performance as a key aide to the president was substandard."

Rivera said there is a dearth of black people in the Trump administration and that Omarosa may have "survived" longer than necessary because of that fact.

He called Omarosa's book -- which she has been hawking on other cable networks -- a "treacherous" work, but said Trump responded in a "distasteful and egregious way" to it.

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