By Zachary Leeman | February 26, 2019
“Avengers” and “Pulp Fiction” star Samuel L. Jackson has never been a fan of President Donald Trump, but the actor took things a little far this week when he compared the commander-in-chief to a slaveholder and plantation owner.
Jackson’s latest Trump critique was in response to the president’s going after liberal director Spike Lee for his politically charged acceptance speech at Sunday night’s Academy Awards.
Jackson, a longtime collaborator with Lee, announced the director as the winner of the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for “BlackKklansman.”
On stage, Lee and Jackson embraced — and Lee proceeded to ramble about slavery and encourage people to “mobilize” against “hate” in the “2020 presidential election.”
“The 2020 presidential election is around the corner,” said Lee, reading from handwritten sheets of paper. “Let’s all mobilize. Let’s all be on the right side of history. Make the moral choice between love versus hate. Let’s do the right thing.”
Though he didn’t say Trump’s name, it was clear the outspoken director was targeting the president with his words.
Trump responded on Monday by tweeting, “Be nice if Spike Lee could read his notes, or better yet not have to use notes at all, when doing his racist hit on your president, who has done more for African-Americans (Criminal Justice Reform, Lowest Unemployment numbers in History, Tax Cuts,etc.) than almost any other pres!”
TMZ caught up with Jackson on Monday to see what he thought about the tiff between Lee and Trump, as well as the accomplishments the president touted in his tweet.
“[Trump] said he’s done more for African-Americans than almost any other president,” TMZ’s reporter said to Jackson.
The actor responded by simply saying, “Yeah, he’s got a bigger plantation.”
Lee also responded to Trump via an interview with Entertainment Weekly. He said the president is trying to reframe the conversation by touting successes in black unemployment and criminal justice reform.
“They did the same thing with the African-American players who were kneeling, trying to make it into an anti-American thing, an anti-patriotic thing, and an anti-military thing, but no one’s going for that,” said Lee.
Check out Lee’s Oscars speech below:
This piece originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.
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