Celebrities
Greg Evans
Oct 29, 2022
The Daily Show
The Daily Show's host Trevor Noah has moved to deny that he accused the entire United Kingdom of having a racist reaction to Rishi Sunak becoming prime minister after getting into a spat with Piers Morgan.
Noah went viral earlier this week for a video where he attempted to 'unpack the backlash' against Sunak being named as the next minister, following the abrupt end to Liz Truss's short reign in the role.
In the video which has been viewed more than 2 million times on Twitter, Noah claims that some people have said: "now the Indians are going to take over Great Britain."
While there will have no doubt have sadly been a racist reaction to Sunak's coronation the majority of backlash to the new PM has been about his policies rather than his ethnicity or religion.
The likes of former chancellor, Sajid Javid and Andrew Neil have since called out Noah, saying his claims were "simply wrong" and "made up."
\u201cSimply wrong. A narrative catered to his audience, at a cost of being completely detached from reality. \n\nBritain is the most successful multiracial democracy on earth and proud of this historic achievement.\u201d— Sajid Javid (@Sajid Javid) 1666878634
\u201cNoah simply made this up. There is no backlash. Not even a scintilla of one. Nobody cares. Nor is there such a thing as Prime Minister of England. Noah was nowhere near as funny as Jon Stewart. Nor as smart. That showed in the ratings. No wonder his show is ending. @TheDailyShow\u201d— Andrew Neil (@Andrew Neil) 1667046044
Piers Morgan also chimed in to say: "There’s been no such backlash against Sunak, you race-baiting twerps. Why does US media keep falsely portraying Britain as a racist country?"
Noah fired back at the former Good Morning Britain host by saying that he never said that it was the entire UK that was racist. The South African comedian wrote: "C’mon Piers you’re smarter than that. I wasn’t saying 'The entire U.K. is racist', I was responding to the racists who don’t want Rishi as PM because of his race. That’s why I said. 'Some people.'
\u201cC\u2019mon Piers you\u2019re smarter than that. I wasn\u2019t saying \u201cThe entire U.K. is racist\u201d, I was responding to the racists who don\u2019t want Rishi as PM because of his race. That\u2019s why I said. \u201cSome people\u201d \ud83d\ude43\n\nhttps://t.co/QQgEQ45wJU\u201d— Trevor Noah (@Trevor Noah) 1666974396
Morgan replied to this by accusing Noah of making the racist backlash up and while also taking an entirely unnecessary pop at Meghan Markle. The 57-year-old said: "No, you c’mon Trevor… there was no ‘backlash’ in UK to @RishiSunak becoming PM because of his heritage. You made that up to create a racism narrative that simply didn’t happen… and we Brits are bored of US media (& disingenuous duchesses) making us out to be a bunch of racists."
\u201cNo, you c\u2019mon Trevor\u2026 there was no \u2018backlash\u2019 in UK to @RishiSunak becoming PM because of his heritage. You made that up to create a racism narrative that simply didn\u2019t happen\u2026 and we Brits are bored of US media (& disingenuous duchesses) making us out to be a bunch of racists.\u201d— Piers Morgan (@Piers Morgan) 1666975025
In his monologue, Noah said: "What I mean by that is this, you hear a lot of the people saying 'Oh, they're taking over, now the Indians are going to take over Great Britain and what's next? 'And I always find myself going 'So what? What are you afraid of?''
"'I think it's because the quiet part a lot of people don't realise they are saying is 'We don't want these people who were previously oppressed to get into power because then they may do to us what we did to them.'"
In September, Noah announced that he would be departing from The Daily Show after seven years at the helm.
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