Thompson was gunned down on a New York City street last week, prompting an investigation by police. Authorities on Monday announced Ivy League graduate and Maryland native Luigi Mangione is now their prime suspect.
Lorenz addressed the killing, saying her response is due to her belief in the "sanctity of life."
"I think that's why I felt, along with so many other Americans, joy unfortunately," Lorenz said. The show's cohosts appeared to grimace in response.
"Joy?" Morgan interjected. "Serious? Joy at a man's execution?"
"Maybe not joy, but certainly not empathy," she added.
"We're watching the footage, how can this make you joyful?" Morgan pressed as security camera footage of the shooting appeared on screen. "He's a husband, he's a father and he's been gunned down in the middle of Manhattan. Why does that make you joyful?"
Lorenz went on to accuse "greedy health insurance executives" of killing Americans by denying them care.
"Should they all be killed then?" Morgan asked. "Would that make you even more joyful?"
"No, that would not," Lorenz said. She went on to condemn "vigilante justice," but said she supported the way the killing has brought attention to the American healthcare system.
"The idea that I would view it as something joyful, that a man -- he's just a healthcare executive -- has been gunned down in street, I find completely bizarre."
Lorenz wrote a piece last week on her Substack page titled "why 'we' want insurance executives dead." She clarified she was not speaking in her personal capacity, but summarizing the online sentiment in reaction to the killing.
"If you have watched a loved one die because an insurance conglomerate has denied their life saving treatment as a cost cutting measure, yes, it's natural to wish that the people who run such conglomerates would suffer the same fate," she wrote.
"This is what the media fails to understand. They don't see insurance CEOs who sanction the deaths of thousands of innocent people a year by denying them coverage, often coverage doctors deem medically necessary, as violent," Lorenz added.
Lorenz notes via her Substack profile that she can no longer work for legacy media companies due to wanting "autonomy over what I publish and deem newsworthy."