George Takei on Clarence Thomas: "He is a clown in blackface sitting on the Supreme Court"

Takei responded to Thomas' Obergefell v. Hodge dissent

Published July 2, 2015 4:45PM (EDT)

George Takei       (AP/Victoria Will)
George Takei (AP/Victoria Will)

In an interview with a local Phoenix, Arizona television station, actor George Takei responded to Clarence Thomas' dissent in Obergefell v. Hodge, the Supreme Court case that officially legalized same-sex marriage across the country.

"He is a clown in blackface sitting on the Supreme Court," said Takei. "He gets me that angry. He doesn't belong there."

"The corollary of that principle is that human dignity cannot be taken away by the government," Thomas wrote in his dissent. "Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them... The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away."

"And for him to say slaves have dignity, I mean, doesn't he know that slaves were in chains? That they were whipped on the back?" he continued. "My parents lost everything that they worked for in the middle of their lives, in their 30s. His business, my father's business, our home, our freedom and we're supposed to call that dignified?... This man does not belong on the Supreme Court. He is an embarrassment. He is a disgrace to America."

Watch the clip below:


By Joanna Rothkopf

MORE FROM Joanna Rothkopf


Related Topics ------------------------------------------

Clarence Thomas George Takei Obergefell V. Hodges Same-sex Marriage Video