DL Hughley has responded to Stephen A. Smith, and he is not backing down. After Stephen A. used his podcast to go after DL for criticizing his White House dinner with Trump, DL fired back on his own podcast with a pointed question: why are people who have a disdain for Black folks so comfortable around Stephen A.?
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The back and forth started after Stephen A. spent more than four hours at the White House last Thursday at a dinner with Trump, Bill Maher and Kid Rock. Stephen A. has said he came as Maher’s guest and that his passion for HBCUs is what made him accept the invitation. He has stood by the visit ever since, telling The View on Wednesday that he is not apologizing to anybody for it.
DL was one of the loudest critics, and Stephen A. made it personal. “I’m going to say his name. D.L. Hughley,” Stephen A. said on his podcast. “There’s one excuse after another. But the latest involves me taking a visit to the White House.”
He then questioned who else was going to have that conversation, before taking a shot at DL’s standing. “Your [expletive] can’t get to the White House,” he said. “[Expletive], the rate you going, you can’t get to the Black House.”
Stephen A. accused DL of “throwing out names like sellouts and coons” and went after his look and his comedy too. “Supposed to be a comedian making people laugh. Looking like you got horns coming out of your [expletive] head,” he said. “What you doing for the Black community other than popping [expletive]?”
He told DL he was showing Black people “where the dead ends are” and brought up Steve Harvey’s success as a comparison. “You ain’t make people laugh no more,” Stephen A. said. “You can go on the air and talk [expletive] and have nothing else going for you or your life. But you ain’t selling out. I am.”
DL Hughley did not take the bait on the insults. He went straight to the results. “I think he went into it knowing he wasn’t going to get anything for us, but he definitely walked away with something for himself,” DL said. “I get to say I met with a president.”
If the dinner was about HBCUs, DL wanted specifics. “What did you ask for? What number did you ask him for?” he said. “Because you can easily get on your podcast and be like, hey, I told him we need to double the budget that they allotted to HBCUs. But you didn’t say any of that.” He added that for someone who calls himself a journalist, Stephen A. came back with very little to report.
DL also pointed to what he sees as a double standard in who sets Stephen A. off. “He got more angry at his peers giving him the thumbs down award than he did at a man who impugned his integrity, his intelligence and his humanity,” DL said. “When they gave him the thumbs down, he went scorched earth. When Trump impugned his intelligence, he went to dinner.”
He made clear Stephen A. is free to sit with whoever he wants, but he is not buying the reason. “Don’t tell me that you did that for altruistic reasons. You did it for you,” DL said. “Just like Bill Maher does it for him. Just like Kid Rock does it for him.”
Then DL Hughley named names. You go to Sean Hannity, who has no love for Black people. You go to Brandon Tatum, no love for Black people,” he said. “Kid Rock has said horrible [expletive]. Trump has said horrible [expletive]. Bill Maher has said horrible [expletive]. And you break bread with him.”
DL said that comfort tells him everything. He said nobody who disrespects Black people would ever feel at ease around him, because he would speak up. “If we were friends, don’t tell me what somebody said about me,” he said. “Tell me what you said when they said it.”
He closed with the line that summed up his whole argument. “I think that it says something about you when the people who hate us like you,” DL said. “Why is it the people that hate my heroes love you?”
