Julianna Margulies has apologized for inflammatory remarks she made concerning the Black and LGBTQ+ communities.
The “Good Spouse” star’s feedback, made on a Nov. 20 episode of actor/producer Andy Ostroy’s “Again Room” podcast, went viral Friday on X, the platform previously referred to as Twitter. The primary drivers of the backlash have been two very provocative feedback: her acknowledged perception that the “complete Black group” could have been “brainwashed to hate Jews” and her warning about what would occur to a queer one that “stepped foot in an Islamic nation.”
In a press release to Deadline on Friday, Margulies mentioned:
“I’m horrified by the truth that statements I made on a current podcast offended the Black and LGBTQIA+ communities, communities I actually love and respect. I wish to be 100% clear: Racism, homophobia, sexism, or any prejudice towards anybody’s private beliefs or identification are abhorrent to me, full cease. All through my profession I’ve labored tirelessly to fight hate of all type, finish antisemitism, communicate out towards terrorist teams like Hamas, and forge a united entrance towards discrimination. I didn’t intend for my phrases to sow additional division, for which I’m sincerely apologetic.”
Axelle/Bauer-Griffin through Getty Photographs
Margulies was known as a bigot by many on social media over her remarks.
Throughout the podcast, Margulies recognized herself as a Jew and spoke of the current spike in antisemitism for the reason that begin of the Israel-Hamas warfare. (There’s additionally been a big uptick in Islamophobia.)
Eight minutes in, her remarks took an alarming flip when she expressed her perception that Jews don’t obtain sufficient help from different marginalized teams.
“I’m the primary individual to march [for] Black Lives Matter. When that occurred to George Floyd, I put a black display screen on my Instagram, like I ran to help my Black brothers and sisters,” Margulies mentioned.
She added: “When LGBTQ persons are being attacked, I run. I made a business for same-sex marriages with my husband in 2012. Like, I’m the primary individual to leap up when one thing is fallacious, as I believe most Jews are, as a result of we’ve been persecuted from the start of time.”
After implying that Black and queer individuals owe Jews their help, she lashed out at younger individuals who have pro-Palestinian sentiments, calling them “loopy individuals” who’re “getting their information from TikTok.”
“Earlier than one bomb was dropped on Oct. 7, earlier than one bomb was dropped in retaliation for a brutal, barbaric assault, individuals have been already on their bullhorns saying the Jews deserved it,” Margulies mentioned.
Ostroy mentioned he thinks some “individuals hate Jews” as a result of “all through historical past” they’ve been “industrious, profitable, resourceful, completed,” and that “threatens lots of people.”
Ostroy added, “, if we use the fallacious pronouns on faculty campuses, there’d be an uproar.”
“Oh, my God, neglect it,” Margulies responded. “It’s these children who’re spewing this antisemitic hate that don’t know in the event that they stepped foot in an Islamic nation — these individuals who need us to name them they/them, or no matter they need us to name them, which I’ve respectfully actually made some extent of doing ― it’s these those that would be the first individuals beheaded, and their heads performed with … like a soccer ball on the sphere.”
Margulies then talked a few movie screening by a “Black lesbian membership on the Columbia campus” promoted with flyers that she mentioned learn “No Jews allowed.” She seems to be referring to an October incident when a screening at “a membership for queer girls and nonbinary individuals run by college students of coloration” was promoted with a be aware on its flyer that mentioned, “It’s FREE PALESTINE over right here. Zionists aren’t invited,” in line with the Columbia Spectator scholar newspaper.
“As somebody who performs a lesbian journalist on ‘The Morning Present,’ I’m extra offended by it as a lesbian than I’m as a Jew, to be trustworthy with you,” Margulies mentioned.
Later within the interview, she talked about Ken Burns’ documentary “The U.S. and the Holocaust” and mentioned it must be “obligatory watching, particularly for the Black group, if I could.”
“The Nazis have been watching how the Jim Crow South was treating slaves and mentioned, ‘Oh, nice name, let’s try this playbook. That’s what we’ll do to the Jews.’ Which can be why, within the civil rights motion, the Jews have been those that walked aspect by aspect with the Blacks to combat for his or her rights, as a result of they know. And now the Black group isn’t embracing us and saying, ‘We stand with you the best way you stood with us’?”
Margulies added, “As a result of the truth that the whole Black group isn’t standing with us to me says both they only don’t know or they’ve been brainwashed to hate Jews.”