One Racist GOP Lawmaker Down: How Many More Will Resign Due to Sasha Baron Cohen’s Show?
British comedian and actor Sacha Baron Cohen made his career impersonating fictional characters like Borat, the folksy-yet-bigoted Kazakhstani journalist, and Brüno, a superficial gay Austrian fashion reporter. But his latest role as anti-terrorist expert Captain Erran Morad in his new Showtime comedy series Who Is America? has made him famous yet again, this time for helping get a Republican Georgia state Representative Jason Spencer to resign after convincing Spencer to bare his naked butt and scream the N-word on television. He’s only the latest conservative to be humiliated for acting like a jackass on Cohen’s show, leaving us to wonder: Who’s next?
In past episodes of Who Is America?, Cohen got California’s Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, South Carolina’s Rep. Joe Wilson and former Senate leader Trent Lott all to sign on to the idea of teaching school children how to use firearms. He got former Vice President Dick Cheney to sign a waterboarding kit and duped former Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin though it’s not yet clear how (the episode hasn’t aired yet).
But while some of these Republicans might just laugh off their appearances on Cohen’s show, Spencer’s appearance left him in a woefully unfunny position.
How Sacha Baron Cohen got Jason Spencer to show his butt on TV
In the segment, Morad claimed to be an ex-Israeli military officer who now teaches anti-terrorist self-defense techniques. After Spencer talks about how Muslims use First Amendment rights “against us,” Morad tells Spencer to imitate a Chinese tourist while placing a selfie stick underneath a person’s burqa to determine whether they have a gun strapped to their thigh.
Spencer then begins spouting a mishmash of Japanese words and words he associates with Chinese people like “dragon” and “chopstick” while performing the task.
Later on, when teaching Spencer how to avoid kidnapping by ISIS, Morad tells Spencer to scream the “n-word.” Spencer screams “nigger” four times before Morad stops him, saying, “You crazy? The n-word is ‘muni,’ not this word. This word is disgusting.”
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Lastly, Morad tells Spencer that “ISIS is scared of being seen as homo. If your buttock touch them, it means they have become a …”
Spencer completes the sentence by saying, “transsexual.” Soon after, Spencer runs backwards with his bare butt towards Morad, repeating “USA.”
Here’s the clip of Jason Spencer shouting slurs and bearing his butt on TV:
In another clip from the show, Spencer told “sand niggers over in the Middle East, we are tired of you coming over” before threatening to cut off their penises, asking, “How are you gonna rape children and women without a dick?”
While not everyone will find humor in these clips, Cohen chose a well-deserving target. Spencer is a known Islamophobe who submitted a bill that would’ve made it illegal for Muslim women to wear burqas in public. He once warned another black representative that she might “go missing” if she tried to remove any Confederate statues from Georgia.
Spencer lost his 2018 primary against his Republican opponent Steven Sainz but could’ve kept his seat until after the general election in November. If he had, he would’ve logged eight years of public service and received free healthcare for life. But he also would’ve faced ethical complaints and a possible investigation by fellow lawmakers. So …
Instead, he recently announced his intention to resign on July 31, 2018 stating, “Sacha Baron Cohen and his associates took advantage of my paralyzing fear that my family would be attacked.” Spencer claims Cohen told him the footage would be used as an instructional video in Israel.
“I deeply regret the language I used at (Cohen’s) request as well as my participation in the ‘class’ in general. If I had not been so distracted by my fears, I never would have agreed to participate in the first place. I apologize to my family, friends, and the people of my district for this ridiculously ugly episode,” Spencer said.
Accused pedophile and former GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore will appear on a future episode of Cohen’s show as will racist former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Not all of the Republicans who appear on Cohen’s show will have jobs to lose, like Spencer. But their reputations might end up in tatters, that is, if you believe Republican politicians still care about that sort of thing.
