Saturday Night Live cast member and Chicago native Cecily Strong told some pretty brutal jokes at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner Saturday night. One observation, however, about the extrajudicial killing of Black men in the United States seemingly pushed the boundaries and buttons of many of those in attendance.
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Playing off a string of Secret Service lapses, including a “quod chopter” drone that went undetected and landed on the White House’s south lawn, Strong joked, “I bet when the president walked in [the Washington Hilton] and saw all the bellhops he thought, “Wow, finally some decent security.”
As the crowd groaned, and President Obama gave his best neutral half-grin, Strong went for the jugular. With fiery protests blazing just 30 miles away in Baltimore over the brutal police killing of 25-year-old Freddie Gray, Strong said she’d cut the Secret Service some slack.
“No, I’m just kidding,” Strong said. “Let’s give it up for the Secret Service. I don’t want to be too hard on those guys. You know, because they’re the only law enforcement agency in the country that will get in trouble if a Black man gets shot.”
There was a smattering of awkward chuckles, loud groans and a few boos, to which Strong responded, “Are you saying ‘boo’ or are you saying ‘true?'”
Strong’s biting observation comes at the 4:00 minute mark in the video clip above.
Weigh in, NewsOne readers!
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