Amid continued backlash over his material about transgender people, Dave Chappelle argues his approach stands in contrast to the Republican Party, which he says “weaponizes” the jokes for political gain.
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During a recent interview, the comedian spoke out against Republicans, accusing some people within the party of turning transgender-related humor into a political tool. Chappelle has been at the center of controversy since 2021, when his Netflix special, The Closer, featured jokes that many viewers labeled as transphobic.
At the time, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos defended the special on the grounds of “artistic freedom,” which led to a walkout by transgender employees and their supporters. Chappelle later revisited similar material in his follow-up special, The Dreamer.
But, even though he doubled back on that brand of humor, he’s speaking up now to slam the Republican party for how they aligned themselves with him.
“I did resent that the Republican Party ran on transgender jokes,” Chappelle told host Michel Martin on NPR’s Newsmakers. “You know, I felt like they were doing a weaponized version of what I was doing. That’s not what I was doing. I’ll give you an example, before I learned the phrase, ‘I respectfully decline,’ I was on Capitol Hill, and everybody ran up to take pictures with me from every congressional office. And I just take pictures with whoever asked. I didn’t ask how they vote or what their voting record is.”
“At first, it was CBC people,” the comedian continued. “Then here comes Lauren Boebert and she said, ‘Can I get a picture?’ And I had already taken 40 pictures. I didn’t want to say no in front of everybody, but I didn’t know the phrase ‘I respectfully decline.’ So I just took the picture. And then she posted the picture before I could even get from there to the show and says something to the effect of, ‘Just two people that know that it’s just two genders.’ Just instantly, like, weaponized or politicized. So I got to the arena, and I lit her a** up for doing that. And she should never do that to a person like me.”
Netflix has continued to support the Chappelle’s Show creator despite the ongoing criticism surrounding his jokes about transgender people. His eighth stand-up special on the platform was released last December.
This same backlash has been aimed at Chappelle since 2021, with venues like First Avenue canceling scheduled performances years later due to the controversy. In 2023, the venue issued an apology to its community for booking Chappelle and reaffirmed its commitment to being a “safe space.”
“I guess apparently they had made a pledge to the public at large that they would make their club a safe space for all people, and that they would ban anything they deemed transphobic,” Chappelle said on his Midnight Miracle podcast at the time. “This is a wild stance for an artistic venue to take, especially one that’s historically a punk rock venue.”
After slamming the Republican party, the comedian was also asked by NPR whether he finds Donald Trump funny. In his response, Chappelle had some mixed feelings about whether or not he’s able to laugh at the harmful antics of someone who has so much power.
“Maybe if he wasn’t president, I’d think that was funny. Or maybe at times… I do think, you know, that that’s wearing thin,” Chappelle said. “There are funny things about him. Like, if I were to talk about him, it would be funny. But I think what he does is so consequential and so much of these things, you know, in my lifetime, I’ve never really seen anything of a phenomenon quite like I’m not trying to be political, but it’s remarkable. I don’t know. I don’t know how funny it is.”
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