Steve Harvey stated he is a “man on integrity” in an interview with PEOPLE at a Celebrity Family Feud event Sunday in LA.
The remarks came almost a week after his furious discussion with Mo’Nique on his talk show ”Steve,” where he indicated that the Oscar-winning actress should put her integrity to the side when trying to collect that check.
“I’ve got to slow down when I’m talking,” Harvey shared with the entertainment magazine. “I can’t get into heated discussions, and I’ve got to just guard my words more carefully.”
The comedians disagreed when Mo’Nique said integrity and equality meant more to her than a check, referring to her situation with Netflix.
“Before the money game, it’s called the integrity game, and we’ve lost the integrity worried about the money,” she stated to Harvey.
He responded, “If I crumble, my children crumble, my grandchildren crumble. I cannot for the sake of my integrity stand up here and let everybody that’s counting on me crumble so that I can make a statement. There are ways to win the war in a different way.”
After the episode aired, Harvey became a topic of many discussions in reference to race and wealth. Multiple people on social media observed how public figures like Colin Kaepernick and Muhammad Ali preserved their integrity in their battles for equality.
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Since then, the ”Family Feud” host has contemplated about his way of critiquing Mo’Nique, and he regrets how they slipped off his tongue.
“I take full responsibility for it, it came out my mouth, so I can’t say that I didn’t say it. But to people that really know me, I have lived my whole life as a man of integrity. So when I was referring to ‘integrity’ in that interview, I was talking about the method in which things were being done, and that is all it was.”
“I regret it, but I want young people, the kids that come to my camps, the young people that I mentor, the fans that really respect me, to know to just charge that one to my head and not to my heart,” he continued.
Harvey stated that he was only trying to help Mo’Nique’s unrestricted approach to managing outcomes.
