Rocio Mateos
Johnny Depp went under fire after he joked about killing President Donald Trump while he was onstage at the Glastonbury Festival in England on Thursday.
The 54-year-old actor made an appearance at Glastonbury for a screening of his 2004 film, ‘The Libertine,’ at Cinemageddon. When he got onstage, he asked the audience, “Can you bring Trump here?” Naturally, the crowd began booing, but Depp followed up to say “No, no, no, you misunderstood completely. I think he needs help and there are a lot of wonderful dark, dark places he could go.”
Then he said, “By the way, this is going to be in the press. It will be horrible. I like that you are all a part of it,” and followed to ask the audience, “When was the last time an actor assassinated a president?”, and received cheers and claps back. He continued, “I want to clarify, I’m not an actor. I lie for a living.”
He was right about how horrible things would turn out in the press. It was just a matter of minutes for the comments to go around the world, and to get his reference to John Wilkes Booth, the actor who assassinated President Abraham Lincoln in 1865.
Of course, his joke was widely condemned and perceived as offensive and completely out of place.
The Secret Service also popped up to say it is aware of the comments. Threatening the president is a crime under U.S. law. “For security reasons, we cannot discuss specifically nor in general terms the means and methods of how we perform our protective responsibilities,” the Secret Service said in a statement, according to NBC News.
Depp apologized for his comments
Following the heat surrounding his joke, Depp released a statement exclusively to People Magazine, apologizing for his comments.
“I apologize for the bad joke I attempted last night in poor taste about President Trump,” he said. “It did not come out as intended, and I intended no malice. I was only trying to amuse, not to harm anyone.”
Even the White House released a statement condemning Depp’s remarks. “President Trump has condemned violence in all forms and it’s sad that others like Johnny Depp have not followed his lead.” The statement also called Depp’s comments “rhetoric” and asked for his colleagues to speak out, just like they would if the joke were directed to a Democrat elected official.
This jokes about killing Trump are going out of control
They may seem innocent and harmless, but all those jokes and comments about assassinating Donald Trump do have their consequences.
Before Depp spoke at Glastonbury, other celebrities have come under fire for comments made against the president. In March rapper Snoop Dogg released the music video for his song “Lavender,” in which a clown with a likeness to Trump was shown being shot in the head.
And last month comedian Kathy Griffin pulled out a photo of her posing with a very gory prop of Trump’s decapitated head. She even got fired by CNN.
Just a couple of weeks ago, a gunman opened fire on members of Congress at an Alexandria, Virginia baseball field. While the congressmen were practicing for a charity baseball game. As a result of the shooting, Republican Steve Scalise got injured and he remains hospitalized.
After all this, isn’t it time already to quit the violent discourse, even if it’s “only a joke”?
