Director and producer Spike Lee looks on prior to the start of the evening session during the final day of the Democratic National Convention at the United Center on August 22, 2024, in Chicago, Illinois. | Source: Joe Raedle / Getty
Spike Lee offered a full-throated defense of former President Barack Obama’s recent commentary about Black male voters while imploring the importance of America electing Kamala Harris as the next president.
The celebrated filmmaker spoke in no uncertain terms during an interview on MSNBC that addressed the contentious conversation about Black men and the narrative that a growing number are supporting Donald Trump’s candidacy during a historic election that could give the U.S. not only its first woman president but also the first Black woman president.
When MSNBC host Ari Melber broached the topic of men from all racial backgrounds being “skeptical” of Harris as president and “breaking toward Trump,” Lee cut him off to focus in on Black male voters, in particular.
“It’s sad but true, some of my brothers have been drinking that Kool-Aid and I just hope that they get their minds straight, get their minds right, in time for this election,” Lee said. “If they’re conscious, if they’re aware, there’s nothing that this other guy can do that’s going to put us — not just Black folks — but Americans, in a better position going forward.”
Lee then referenced Obama’s speech earlier this month in which he said Black male voters are “coming up with all kinds of reasons and excuses” not to support Harris’ candidacy, adding later that he’s “got a problem with that.” Obama also suggested that sexism was influencing Black male voters – “Part of it makes me think that, well, you just aren’t feeling the idea of having a woman as president.”
Prior to the speech, Obama met with a group of Black male voters in Pittsburgh and suggested they “don’t have enough sense of what’s at stake” with the election and said they were “lucky” his wife, former first lady Michele Obama, wasn’t there speaking with them instead of him because “she talks serious about this stuff.”
Obama came under some friendly fire from the Black community over those remarks, but Lee, during his MSNBC interview, defended the first Black president.
“I gotta give credit to President Obama because he’s been going really hard on the brothers — some might think too hard, but I don’t think so,” Lee said. “We gotta wake up and don’t go for the okie doke, the flim-flam — can’t do that.”
Lee continued: “We gotta support our sister to be the first woman president of the United States of America and the first sister.”
Lee was among the first Hollywood celebrities to endorse Harris’ candidacy back when President Joe Biden dropped out of the race in July.
MSNBC interviewed Lee after he and 19 others received the National Medals of Arts presented by Biden at a ceremony at the White House.
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